Konoha no San Yuri
by Lord Mendasuit
Summary: Kakashi fell to his knees, trying his hardest to stem the flow of tears from his eyes and clutching a hand to his chest, trying his hardest to stop the ache coming from his heart. Neither was succesful. "Best. Team. Ever." He declared, weeping tears of joy. - In which Naruto is a pervert, Satsuki is gullible and Sakura is the only sane woman.
1. Enter the Lilies

Kakashi sat on a tree branch, on a tree that had not been there that morning, looking through the glass of one of the classroom's upper windows. Sometimes, it paid to be pals with a Mokuton user. That he could do pretty much anything with wood was a funny and awesomely useful thing that he abused maliciously during the time he'd been mentoring the boy… wait, he was an adult now.

Regardless, Kakashi decided he would just sit there for a while and stare, so he did. Usually, he'd be reading his book, but right now he was actually paying attention, because he was actually interested in something other than porn at the moment, even if an inner voice was nagging at him to get back to seeing how Nagase-chan dealt with her growing infatuation to the nondescript protagonist that was obviously Jiraiya's self-insert.

Indeed, Kakashi was interested in the interactions displayed by the three preteens who still found themselves locked inside their classroom (even though no lock would stop a determined ninja), one hour after the latest of sensei came to pick up their students. Indeed, the only one who reneged on his duty for no less than an entire hour was the one and only Hatake Kakashi.

Otherwise known as 'Son-Of-A-Bitch-Made-Me-Wait-For-Three-Hours!'

That one was coined by Anko, when he got to his own birthday party three hours late. To his defense, they hadn't kept the secret very well and he felt like being a dick then. He felt like being a dick a lot of the time, actually.

He didn't bother to notice the squirrel that was now snuggling in his hair, using it as makeshift bedding. Nor did he care about the fact that he would disturb its sleep. It had a good two hours of rest before Kakashi would move, and the man himself could hold his position for the rest of the day if he needed to.

So he just sat down and watched. And watched. And watched some more. Just to make sure, he watched some more. Yep. He'd been given the first All-Kunoichi team in Konoha history. He let out a loud groan. He was absolutely dreading this assignment. Then again, they were incredibly likely to fail, as the teams they gave him were pretty much set up to. Who in their right minds thought that the top of the class would willingly work together with the dead-last? The idea was moronic in its entirety.

Well, the Sandaime didn't seem to think so, which meant he was probably senile or something.

If Kakashi had read their files, he might not have had to sit for three hours on a tree branch outside the class to learn more about his students. He was also the kind of guy who thought that files were bullshit (all of his rained praises upon him, when everyone who knew him personally could tell that he was an absolute jackass and proud of it) and that the only way to really get to know someone is by observing them.

Some said that stalking someone for a few weeks before deciding if they're worthy to be your friend of not was being obsessive. Kakashi would point out how he'd found out a gazillion spies using that method and people would shut up.

So he observed some more. His eye was focused on the three girls sitting at the same desk, playing some strange card game that he couldn't quite guess the rules of at first glance. Damn, he was getting old, if he couldn't keep up with kids these days.

Maybe he'd get to be an old pervert! He'd have to ask Jiraiya for tips. He already had the white, spiky hair.

Shaking off his thoughts before they inevitably went to Jiraiya's main body of work, he went back to observing his potential genin students. He analyzed them from their movements, the poker faces they displayed to hide the cards they had on their hands, and he judged them based on their interactions, as well.

His test had begun one hour ago, after all. Unlike the other jounin, when he failed someone, he had reasons to do so that could fill up a hundred page report. This being absolutely over the top, he just contented himself with saying 'They had sucky teamwork' and leaving it at that.

First, he decided to fix his eye on the one clanless kunoichi in his group, Sakura Haruno. Her bubblegum pink hair could be problematic, but then again, ninja pretty much needed to be flashy in their line of work. Contrary to popular opinion, no sane ninja dresses in a black bodysuit covering all of their features unless they're infiltrating somewhere during the night or in the dark.

Therefore, her choice of attire, while not particularly conductive for camouflage in the forest, still served to camouflage her in an urban settlement, as she was dressed not unlike what a civilian working girl would wear. And he didn't mean the kind of working girl he preferred, because that would just be funny rather than sexy, considering her total lack of a figure to flaunt.

He attributed that to unhealthy diet. Easy enough habit to break her out of by forcing her to exhaust herself every day so she is hungrier. That would solve itself, given time.

His eye rolled over to one that made a small shock course through his body, originating from his left eye socket. He smiled, knowing that it was just him imagining things, but he liked to think Obito was reacting approvingly of his niece. Indeed, the girl was the last Uchiha in the village.

She was known as Uchiha Satsuki, the Ice Cold Princess of Konoha. To most, she was an unapproachable, frigid bitch who hated men with a passion unrivalled by the heat of the sun. To a select few, she showed her less cold side. Not warm by any means, but certainly a lot more approachable. You just had to figure out that she would only snark at people she actually liked.

Kakashi had done a few rounds around the girl, back when he was Inu, to make damned sure that nobody got any funny ideas about the girl living alone on her clan compound. It didn't help that she was shaping up to become one of the most attractive Kunoichi in Konoha. Wouldn't be surprising, given her mother. Ultimately, she'd chosen to move to a smaller place (cleaning the compound was an absolute bitch) in the same building as Kakashi's favorite person in Konoha.

Who, you might ask, was Kakashi's favorite person?

The one that made him laugh his ass off in uncountable occasions and happened to be the last thing left of the man who'd been not unlike a father to him. In a sense, he considered her a little sister that he would always protect from the shadows, until she didn't need him any more.

And boy had she grown independent fast. It started when, on a whim, Tenzo taught her the basics of gardening. From then on, the girl had taken a shine to the pastime and had begun to grow her own crops. It helped that she actually owned the entirety of the apartment complex she lived in and could do whatever she wanted with it, including but not limited to turning the rooftop into a greenhouse.

Then she witnessed one of her ANBU guards, who just happened to be Anko, get back at some idiot who'd tried to get a bit too close to her the wrong way (by thinking she was as easy as her clothes implied she was). That day, the little girl had sworn that she would outdo Anko.

And given the fact that there had been a giant 'NARUTO WAS HERE!' painted on the face of the Yondaime Hokage, there was absolutely no doubt that the girl had not only succeeded in surpassing Anko at getting back at people, but done so in an utterly hilarious manner.

He had always been particularly present in Naruto's life since, unlike Satsuki who the village held on a pedestal, Naruto… was not very well liked by the majority of the population. It was funny that those who didn't know her would dislike and fear her, but anyone who spent more than five minutes on the same room with the little ball of fun and sunshine would fall in love with her.

She had won over her classmates, her teachers, her ANBU guard, the Hokage, a variety of shop keepers (mostly the ones who sold her the gardening implements and aids that she used, as well as a few food stall owners) and, most hilariously, Danzo of all people, through sheer cuteness. Convincing the old Warhawk not to put her in the ROOT program because she was too adorable to be put through that was a feat worthy of being enshrined.

Heck, Kakashi was certain that if Konoha found a way to weaponized her cuteness, they'd probably take over the world with zero resistance.

His three students…

… Were not particularly friends when the game started. Indeed, it had taken no less than ten minutes of Naruto bugging both of her classmates until they'd finally agreed to play a game to pass the time. Since then, she had been chatting animatedly with Sakura and obviously trying her hardest to involve the taciturn and gloomy Satsuki.

At first, Satsuki had been her usual frigid self, something that seemed to absolutely frustrate Naruto. Sakura had then raved on and on about the coolness of Konoha's Ice Princess, about how she was the kunoichi that would show the world that girls were just as good as boys.

Yeah, Satsuki was a bit of an idol of the academy kunoichi due to her attitude combined with her strength. If Kakashi had to make a wild guess, he would say that she probably didn't give half a shit about making a gender equality statement. The whole gender equality business was bullshit, anyway, since only childish misconception would convince someone that a girl couldn't kick just as much ass as a man. Kakashi could give a rather lengthy list of kunoichi who were just as strong if not stronger than shinobi.

That and disrespecting the seduction corps was tantamount to heresy amongst the ninja corps. After all, the seduction corps took the most mentally demanding and challenging missions and often were incredibly hard on those who willingly sacrificed themselves to the task.

There was absolutely no way he'd let any of those three have to deal with that kind of thing. Kakashi himself had only taken a few seduction missions and he wouldn't wish that fate on anyone. He still observed their interactions.

Both Satsuki and Sakura seemed to be glaring at Naruto, who was just giggling happily. Apparently, during the time that Kakashi was distracted, the game became heated and Naruto came out as the victor. Maybe he ought to pay enough attention to actually hear them instead of just observing them.

Naruto slammed her hand on the table and slid it across the hard wood. Five cards were separated, though they still remained touching each other. The blonde picked up the fifth and uppermost card and used it to flip the other four all at once, showing four Queens. "Poker, girlies." She declared, smirking as she looked at the other two who shared similarly valued double pairs, although Sakura had the advantage with an Ace.

"You cheated!" Sakura yelled, crossing her arms over her still pitifully flat chest and glaring at the blonde, who merely giggled and tossed her hair back in a haughty manner that was totally at odds with her usual demeanor.

"It's just pure skill, Sakura-chan!" Replied the rather flippant blonde, running a hand through her wavy golden locks and smoothing them as she did. "If I had cheated, Satsuki-chan would've noticed, ne?"

The Uchiha grunted, narrowed her eyes and let out a rather undignified growl. "You can't get those kinds of cards, all on a row! I don't know how, but you cheated, and I will find out how!" Sakura said, before Satsuki could let loose a string of insults.

Naruto offered both of them an impish grin. "I don't have sleeves to hide cards in!" she noted.

Indeed, she didn't. Her jacket was thrown aside, resting on a chair not too far away, and she was left wearing a black tank top that did nothing to hide her thin arms. Sakura's eyes trailed the tan skin of her arms, looking for anywhere that could hide the cards she replaced, but it was to no avail. "Crap… she's right." Sakura admitted.

"You're wearing a skirt, too, you could hide them there." Satsuki remarked.

Naruto, still grinning, stood up. "My skirt has no pockets, Satchan." Spoke the blonde, before giving both of the other kunoichi a rather strange and frightening smile… and lifting her skirt, showing the white cotton of her underwear for all to see. "And as you can see, I'm not hiding anything under it."

Blushing, both Sakura and Satsuki yelled at the shameless blonde. "Stop doing that you pervert!" Yelled Sakura.

"I didn't think you were that desperate, dobe." Satsuki remarked, though her blush betrayed her own embarrassment.

"But you're not looking away." Naruto noted, before letting go of her skirt and sitting back down, laughing the whole way. "Anyway, you both lost and I didn't cheat. You shouldn't have bet so big if you didn't have anything on your hands!" She said, her face morphing into a cheshire grin.

Sighing loudly, Satsuki began the process of removing the blue shirt she was wearing, revealing a second, white shirt made of-most likely- silk. Kakashi's eyes almost bugged out. His students… were playing strip poker!? What the hell?

"That's not all you bet, Satchan!" Said Naruto, smirking. "C'mon, you wouldn't want Sensei to barge in before we're done, now would you?"

With an almost luminescent blush, Satsuki grabbed the hem of her white shirt and pulled it up, revealing the white bandages that hid her modesty. "… I'm not taking off the rest." She said, glaring at the blonde.

"Oh?" She said, smiling cheerfully. "I wouldn't have thought that you would be a coward, Satchan!" Naruto's voice was positively frightening, and frighteningly sweet and honeyed, as if she'd just told her that she had no option whatsoever. "Wouldn't wanna shame your family by being a coward, now would you?"

"That's a low blow, Uzumaki!" Growled Sakura.

"S-She's right." Satsuki muttered. "Mother… would not have hesitated." She concluded, before standing up and walking slightly to the side so that she had space.

"Attagirl." The blonde said, smiling.

Satsuki began to tug at the elastic that kept her shorts tightly clinging to her soft, pale skin, and then, in clear discomfort and with bravado brought on from her own shame, she quickly pulled them down, revealing her lacy underwear to her teammates. The fact that she was making an accurate impression of a tomato caused her to have the image of a perverted shy girl.

Sakura's mouth began to open and close like a fish's, and she knew and was horrified by the fact that she was next. Indeed, foolishly thinking that they'd get to punish Naruto for suggesting the game in the first place, they'd both decided to bet big this round, confident that, like the last one, Naruto would foolishly charge in with absolutely nothing on hand. That damnable poker had caused them both to lose the majority of their clothes and be left with only their underwear.

Sakura's shorts were a bit more skin tight than Satsuki's, so she couldn't just peel them off her skin as quickly as the other girl had. Therefore, she had unintentionally given the other two a rather thorough show as she went through the motions necessary to remove them, hindered in speed by her own nerves and embarrassment.

Her battle dress was next to go, leaving her only wearing a long white shirt that doubled as a skirt to hide her pink panties from the view of her perverted teammate and the girl she admired. Even now her respect for Satsuki had only grown, and Sakura felt like she had to do this to present herself as an equal to the one who she admired.

So with a loud and rather suffering groan, Sakura revealed her flat chest and pink underwear.

"Hora, you two are so cute!" Naruto declared, as the two embarrassed and almost-naked girls sat back down around the table. Both were, as preteens are wont to be, quite flat chested, though whereas Sakura's chest could be confused with that of a little boy's, Satsuki had the beginning of hers already manifesting through the bandages that kept them in place.

"Stop looking at us like that, you pervert…" Sakura muttered. "This is totally unfair, we won't be able to concentrate like this."

Satsuki frowned. "It's just training." She declared, though mostly it seemed to be a mantra that she kept repeating so she wouldn't succumb to her own embarrassment. So Naruto had probably convinced Satsuki to play strip poker with the excuse that it was some sort of training exercise. Clever; Satsuki was a bit of a nut when it came to training.

"But it's too embarrassing…" Sakura muttered, trying to cover her chest and crotch with her cards as best as she could, as Naruto dealt them five each.

"Hm… if you're embarrassed about being the only ones naked here… I've got a solution!" Naruto declared, cheerfully. In a second and a flash of clothing, her skirt and shirt went flying through the air, revealing her bare chest and the white cotton of her underwear.

"Wha-What- What the- How- Why- WHAT THE HELL!?" Sakura finally managed, after stammering for words to push out of her system.

Naruto grinned even more impishly than before for an instant, such a short time that it would only be perceived by a veteran ninja. "I'm not as cute as you two, but I can't be so ugly that you hate to see me, ne?" She asked, adopting a mock hurt expression. She looked much like a kicked puppy, right then and there, tears coming to her eyes.

"Ack- Sorry, I didn't mean that!" Sakura yelled, sounding surprisingly apologetic for someone who was pissed seconds before.

She was good, Kakashi noted, at manipulating her teammates to do what she wished them to do. And right now, she was on the business of trolling the everloving fuck out of them. And Kakashi was finding it both extremely inappropriate and exceedingly hilarious.

With a quick movement, Kakashi deposited the squirrel that had been resting on his ridiculous hair do against a branch of the recently made tree away from the one he was on and he stood up. With a couple of handsigns, he summoned a gust of wind, a cloud of smoke and plucked several leaves out of their proper place.

With the body flicker, he was gone.

* * *

Sarutobi Hiruzen blinked and looked at the shinobi that had barged into the office.

Kakashi fell to his knees, trying his hardest to stem the flow of tears from his eyes and clutching a hand to his chest, trying his hardest to stop the ache coming from his heart. Neither was succesful. "Best. Team. Ever." He declared, weeping tears of joy.

* * *

Somewhere, Jiraiya felt like pumping his fist and yelling about how awesome the world was, for some reason he couldn't recognize. As he was currently occupied, he did not do so. However, he did make a mental note to properly celebrate, even if he didn't know why.

* * *

If the title didn't already wise you up to it, yes, this is done entirely for the purposes of having the most yuritastic Team 7 in recorded history.


	2. Violent Attractions

Kakashi walked into the classroom, exactly three hours after he was supposed to show up (he counted it to the second), and looked over his team, analyzing them silently and critically for ten seconds. "Hello, I'm your new sensei."

He then proceeded to gauge their reactions, looking at how the pinkette glared bloody murder at him (it actually kind of scared him, he'd only seen such powerful glares in the eyes of much higher ranked kunoichi) while gritting her teeth. Apparently, in the time he'd been gone, something more had happened that he'd lost the privilege to see.

Bummer.

His eyes then rolled to the pinkette's right. There sat a stoic-as-ever Uchiha Satsuki. Except that the impact of her stoic demeanor was very much lessened by the slight tinge of pink that still remained across her cheeks. And she also seemed dead set on glaring a hole on her desk. One of Kakashi's eyebrows raised.

He'd already known that Naruto would most likely have no problem getting the Ice Princess to open up, at least slightly. The Hokage had explained the reason why he'd put this team together in the first place. Not out of some dumb, out dated tradition, but because Satsuki was a huge flight risk.

The Haruno girl, Sakura, had been chosen to round up the team. The other two were definitely shoe-ins for an assault team, but they also lacked any potential to become self sufficient in that task. While Satsuki had shown a lot of talent with Taijutsu and Ninjutsu, she hadn't shown very much talent in the arts of genjutsu, her grades when it came to basic first aid had been passable at best and she did not show any aptitude to increase those abilities whatsoever.

Naruto's appalling chakra control made the thought of her learning medical jutsu laughable at best. Genjutsu were a lost cause (conversely, it would be easy for her to break out of genjutsu the moment she learned the slightest bit of control of her… other… chakra, since it disrupted any and all chakra constructs, which Genjutsu were by nature), as well.

Kakashi absent mindedly noted that if she had started her training in chakra control by age four, then maybe today she'd be able to do the basic three. As it was, she could do none of them. Kawarimi? She overpowered that so much that she'd probably hurt herself from the sheer speed of the replacement. Bunshin? So much chakra in them that they were almost physical, but not quite, which made them look very weird for the two seconds they'd exist before dispelling.

Henge was where things got interesting. Somewhere down the line, Naruto screwed up the handseals for her henge. Later on, it'd be revealed that she couldn't actually read the kanji in the sheet that she'd been given, but before that had been fixed, Naruto managed to do the impossible and make up a new jutsu on the spot, one that actually made use of her obscene chakra reserves and made her transformation true.

Not very efficient, but nearly impossible to dispel and detect unless you were specifically monitoring Naruto's chakra before and after she performed the henge.

"You. Are. Late." Sakura said, her voice low, cold and with a note of warning to it that made Kakashi smile. She had potential to be a superb kunoichi, too, if she could direct her temper at her enemies.

Satsuki's blush cleared from her face and she too joined Sakura in glaring at Kakashi, except on her part, the glare was the standard way she looked at people. "Three hours." She remarked, her voice positively frigid.

In contrast, Naruto merely smiled widely. "Hi!" She called, waving at him, almost causing Kakashi to fall down. There was no way that she was that ridiculously cheerful after being made to wait for three hours. Then again, it WAS Naruto, she probably got her jollies watching her teammates squirm in boredom. Or maybe what had happened that he'd missed could be the reason why she was so cheerful.

Then again, they'd been playing strip poker when he'd left, so there was a chance that Naruto had managed to embarrass her teammates to the point of keeping her happy until Kakashi came just from that. "My opinion of you?" Kakashi began, his voice a lazy drawl that barely managed to make their glares relent.

Naruto began to rub her chin, in thought. "I think I've seen you somewhere…" she mumbled to herself.

"… I love this team." Kakashi informed, his eyelid somehow managing to beam them a smile. "Meet me in the roof in five minutes!" he said, vanishing in a poof of smoke.

"Couldn't we have continued to talk here? There is no one else in the entire academy." Sakura said, trying her hardest to come up with a reason why they shouldn't turn their teacher into a smear against the wall. And failing.

"The roof is nice. I've been there to eat my lunch a couple of times!" Naruto informed both of her teammates, as she stood up. With a quick movement, she jumped over the desk they'd been using to play Strip Poker, though her doing so caused her skirt to move in the wind, once again showing her underwear for all to see.

"Could you stop doing that?" Sakura asked, sighing and trying her hardest not to blush.

"But Satchan likes it when I do that, Sakura-chan!" Naruto informed, as she landed on her feet. However, as she was not particularly paying attention and she had tried a complicated flip so that she'd land looking at her new teammates, she ended up slipping and falling on her butt painfully. "Owie, that hurt!" she declared, rubbing her bottom.

"Serves you right." Satsuki said, though even Sakura was forced to admit that it sounded less venomous than her usual scathing remarks, though her eyes were intently focused on the lower half of the blonde's anatomy.

As were Sakura's.

The blonde merely giggled. "Don't worry, nothing broke!" She informed them, dusting herself off and standing up fully, offering them both a charming smile. "Let's go, let's go!" She yelled, making a motion as if giving orders to an entire platoon of trained soldiers, before rushing off with a smile.

"This girl is… weird…" Sakura trailed off, looking at the cloud of dust that formed behind the escaping blonde. With much reluctance, she decided to follow at a rather sedate pace.

Satsuki simply sighed, shook her head and began to walk to her destination. Not even she herself noticed the small smile on her face.

When they did meet together again, Naruto was the last to get to the roof, surprising both of the other two, the ones that had walked, since she'd taken off running well before them.

"I may or may not have gotten lost on the way here." Naruto informed them when they asked, prompting them to ask again, this time, however, they asked how she could get lost in the academy. "I don't spend a lot of time here." She confessed, sticking her tongue out in a gesture that showed her clear embarrassment at not knowing the layout of the academy building as well as she should.

Kakashi appeared, of course, three minutes late. "Oh hi everyone."

"Hi again, sensei!" Naruto replied, cheerfully waving her hand at the man, causing the silver haired teacher to ruffle her hair affectionately. This had the side effect of messing up her hairstyle, making her puff her cheeks and blush in anger, trying to look intimidating. She was about as intimidating as a baby fox.

"That… that's not fair…" Sakura said, looking away. "It should not be legal to be that adorable." She mumbled to herself.

Satsuki nodded in dumb agreement.

"Well, girls, since I don't know you and you only barely know each other, I thought it would be best if we introduced ourselves to each other." Kakashi informed them.

"Introduce ourselves… how?" Sakura asked, looking at him while raising an eyebrow.

"Oh, you know, your likes, dislikes, hobbies, dreams, favorite books, food, anything you think your friends ought to know." Kakashi said, waving his hand as if he were throwing the list with the things he was saying away. "Anyway, I'll go first so you can know how it's done." He also actually wanted to introduce himself to this team.

He always got such delightful reactions whenever his students reacted to his introduction.

"My name is Hatake Kakashi, you can call me Kakashi, Kakashi-sensei or just sensei. I have a lot of likes and a few less dislikes. I think I have a few hobbies. I had a dream last night, though you don't want to know what it was about, I'm sure. My favorite book is Icha Icha by the Gamasennin, and I like food."

"So all we learned was that you like a book named Icha Icha and your name." Sakura summarized, which caused him to smile and nod. Sakura absent mindedly decided that she would find a way to get back at her teacher.

"Yep! Information on jounin is classified." The man informed. "Anyway, since you oh so generously volunteered, why don't you go first, pinkie?"

Sakura sighed. "My name is Sakura, not pinkie!" She yelled, glaring at the silver haired asshole. "I like reading and I dislike perverts!" She said, glaring at where Naruto whistled innocently. "My hobby is reading. My dream is to become a great kunoichi to impress a certain person I admire." Kakashi let a lecherous smile cover his face, hidden as it was by the mask he wore. He knew something Sakura did not, indeed. "My favorite book is 'The tale of the Utterly Gutsy Shinobi', though I don't know the author, and my favorite food… I don't really have one." She said, thinking about her preferences.

"Okay, then, you go next!" He said, pointing at where Satsuki was fixing the ponytail on her head, taking advantage of the time Sakura was talking to do so.

"My name is Satsuki. There aren't a lot of things I like and many I dislike." She began, sounding as calm as she always did.

"Satchan likes tomatoes!" Naruto informed, popping in from behind the startled Uchiha. "And she dislikes sweet things!" She added.

"W-Wha- How do you know that?!" Asked the utterly shocked Satsuki, letting the hand she was tying drop behind her, showing how silky smooth it was in comparison with Naruto's wavy locks. The comparison was easy to make, since Naruto had thrown herself on the Uchiha's back and was laying her head on the poor girl's shoulder.

"I've seen you steal the tomatoes from my garden, Satchan!" Informed Naruto, her hands snaking their way around the Uchiha's neck until she could hold her still. "And you always throw away the chocolates the boys give you on Valentine's day without even tasting them." She added.

"Get off me, insufferable pervert!" Yelled the Uchiha, grabbing the arms around her neck, and pulling Naruto over herself, intending to throw the pest away. However, she had underestimated the strength that Naruto was using to cling to her, and when she'd thrown the blond away, she'd ended up dragged herself, causing them both to hit the floor rather than just Naruto, landing in a tangle of limbs and bodies.

Naruto let out a rather loud moan of, most likely, pain when she hit the ground, since the Uchiha had landed on top of her a second afterwards, she also let out a just-as-loud grunt. The problem is that, due to the specific way that they had ended up entangling, Satsuki somehow ended with her face planted on Naruto's crotch.

"My, what a pervert!" The blonde said, a somewhat pained smirk on her face.

"Okay, girls, let's break this up before it becomes obscene." Kakashi said. "Poor Satsuki might die from embarrassment if we don't." He added.

"Ah, but I'm so comfortable like this, Sensei!" replied Naruto, smiling widely.

Satsuki shot off like a bullet away from Naruto, her face as red as red can be, and she went to hide behind Sakura so she could die of embarrassment herself with nobody looking at her. Sakura for her part was petrified with her mouth half open. "That… that's not fair…" She mumbled to herself.

"Let's continue on while we still have time." Kakashi said, sighing. "Satsuki-chan, please do finish your introduction."

The Ice Princess, however, had broken all composure and was still trying her hardest to calm down her raging blush. She still did, however, admirably push through and sat back down, using her now loose hair to cover her face as she did. "I-I-I h-h-hate PERVERTS!" She yelled, pointing at Naruto and glaring with the heat of a thousand suns.

"Aw, I love you too, Satchan!" Naruto said, smiling widely. "But don't you think Sakura-chan might get jealous?"

"Shut up already!" Sakura yelled, smacking her upside the head, a fierce blush already showing on her face. "Just let her finish her introduction!"

Meanwhile, Kakashi was busy laughing his ass off internally.

"I don't have a dream… I have an ambition… I will kill a certain person…" It was hard, hellishly so, but the Ice Princess regained her composure and tried her darnedest to push through while not letting herself drop it. It did make her sound more angry than just cold, but it was still better than sounding like the nervous mess that she was feeling like at the moment. "I don't have any hobbies."

"And her favorite food is anything with tomatoes on it!" Naruto piped in. "You're taking too long, Satchan!"

"And whose fault is that?" Spit back the enraged Uchiha.

Naruto merely rubbed the back of her neck and offered her a sheepish smile.

"Okay, then." Kakashi said, shrugging. "Now that we're done with that, it's your turn, goldilocks." The jounin said, pointing at the genin in question.

"I'm Naruto, Konoha's Prankster Queen!" She was quite proud of that fact, the silver haired man noted, as she stood up and said pride rolled off her in waves. "My hobbies are pranks and gardening. I like Satchan, Sakura-chan and ramen! I don't like the three minutes it takes for the ramen to cook!" She said, seemingly absolutely serious when discussing her hatred of the three minutes it took for the ramen to be finished. "I'll be the best like no one ever was, and I will be the first female Hokage ever!"

"Hm. That's nice." Kakashi said, while his entire interest was put into his book.

"Mou… that's mean! You didn't pay attention to me, but you paid attention to them!" She said, stomping her foot against the ground and pouting at her teacher.

The man chuckled and once again ruffled her hair. She really was too cute for her own good, and what he'd done was explicitly to provoke said reaction from her. Maybe this was how Itachi felt when he spoke of bullying Satsuki? It really was too fun not to do it. And she seemed to like the resulting hair ruffling, so it was a win-win situation.

"Anyway, you guys aren't genin yet! There's still another test you must pass before you become full fledged kunoichi of the Leaf." Informed Kakashi, almost regretting letting go of Naruto's head so she would pay full attention to his words.

"What!?" Sakura said, shocked. "We just got done with the graduation test!" And it had been grueling for the few that had terrible physical conditioning, one of those being Sakura herself. "You can't be serious!"

"Oh, but I am!" Said the tallest of the newly formed Team 7. "The academy just tests if you have the potential to become a member of the elite. Of the twenty seven graduates, only the best nine will be allowed to be a part of Konoha's elite shinobi force, the ones that get to have a jounin teacher. The elite is the face of Konoha's shinobi force, so we can't let just anyone be a part of it."

"Makes sense." Satsuki said. The Uchiha Clan had actually been famous as an 'elite clan' not because they were all prodigies, but because they were the clan with the best elite-to-standard shinobi ratio. That much she knew.

"Uh… What happens if we fail?" Naruto didn't seem to be particularly enthused with the thought of this new test coming right the fuck out of nowhere. Kakashi knew why, as the girl had barely scrapped by the test and passed by the skin of her teeth. In fact, he was almost certain she'd passed almost entirely because neither of her teachers could stomach the thought of her depressed from failure.

Then again, they might have just passed her because there was simply no way someone with that much chakra could possibly do such a basic jutsu as the Bunshin. Her chakra control was just too awful and it would never be at that level no matter how hard she practiced.

"Whoever fails their jounin sensei's test is sent back to the academy for a year of remedial training so that they can join the standard shinobi corps!" Kakashi neglected to tell them that if a single one of them failed, all three of them would fail. He would prey on this.

He did not want to fail them. There was too much riding on this team to fail them. Too much politically, and, more important to Kakashi, personally. There was absolutely no way that he'd just let them fail.

Kakashi was, however, much more interested in their well being than he was their happiness. Whilst he would not be looking to fail them, as he actually had many teams before, he would offer them no quarter and no freebies. This would be the most fair test he'd ever given. "Report to training ground three tomorrow at six sharp. Oh, and I suggest you don't eat breakfast. Otherwise, you might vomit it out. Dismissed."

* * *

You know, I'm kinda glad you guys like this, 'cause it's a total blast to write. So much perversion. Poor, poor Satsuki...


	3. Soapy Fun and Breakfast

Satsuki had been going through her morning routine, that is wake up, take care of her hygiene, train for an hour, take a bath and then spend the rest of her time reviewing the material they'd gone over in the academy, mastering it to perfection. Today, she had foregone training and reviewing, considering the circumstances. Halfway through her bath, as she soaked herself in the warm water, it hit her like a jet powered truck.

Or like someone pounding on her door.

"Oi, Satchan!" Yelled someone, as she heard through her panic-enhanced senses the jingle of the owner of the voice fumbling with keys. "It's about time, are you ready?" There was the sound of a lock being unlocked, and of a door being pushed. "Huh… she's not here?"

She wanted to get up and yell, she wanted to curse the idiot for entering her house without permission, she wanted to get out of the bath tub and maul her with it. But there was a very specific problem with doing so. Namely, it'd require getting up to do so naked or covered with a towel. Not to mention, she didn't seem to be aware of her presence.

And for the poor, sexually harassed Satsuki, that was a blessing in and of itself. Her nerves could only take so much without her daily me-time spent in the bath, getting rid of the accumulated grime, aches, nerves and unforgiving rage.

Therefore, Satsuki decided to just lay back, close her eyes and hope for the best. There was absolutely no need to call attention to herself and if she could just stop making noise entirely, perhaps she'd go for the morning without having to deal with the most obnoxious person in her life.

She ruthlessly squashed the small voice in the back of her head that told her to bring attention to herself. She did not, in any shape or form, enjoy the blonde's teasing. No matter what anybody said, she did not swing that way. How would she restore the Uchiha clan to glory if she did? There was simply no choice in the matter, and she was okay with that.

Or so she told herself, anyway.

"Oh, well, I guess she must have already left." Continued the pervert's voice. She seemed… oddly dejected, as if she was but a baby who had her favorite toy taken away. Satsuki resisted the need to snort at the thought. Yeah, Naruto behaved not unlike a spoiled child at times. Then again, just about everybody gave her whatever she wanted whenever she wanted it. Satsuki would be angry about that…

… If it hadn't actually worked on her at times.

She was just too darned adorable when she wanted to be, and that pout felt like someone ripped her heart out and put it through a meat grinder every time she saw it. It was simply not fair to be that cute, and it sometimes pissed Satsuki off, since it allowed her to get away with pretty much anything so long as she looked sad about it later on.

She had gotten away with being tardy to class, with being terrible at pretty much everything, with pranking the teachers, with pranking the students, with pranking the genin teams hired to clean the academy… Sure, some of those were utterly hilarious to see, and that time when she'd somehow managed to glue every desk and chair to the ceiling had even made the usually anally-retentive Iruka laugh… but she had still gotten away with only slaps on the wrist, if even that.

Letting out a long and drawn out sigh, Satsuki grabbed a book resting in a cupboard next to her bathtub and opened the table of context. She visually scanned the page until she found what she was looking for. Her chakra control was less than perfect, and it showed in her difficulty performing the Uchiha's staple Grand Fireball. Oh, yeah, she shouldn't be able to use it at all as a recently graduated genin.

The thought of it was laughable. She'd trained her ass off to have enough chakra to use it more than once a day. The thought of any jutsu, other than bloodline jutsu, being beyond her reach was laughable. Even if she couldn't due to chakra constraints, all she'd need to do is train harder to learn it.

She let herself sink a bit further unto the warm and calming soapy water, while concentrating on the chakra theory she was reading about. Usually, she wouldn't bother with something like this, instead going for the more practical parts. She'd have brought a few pieces of paper with her to do the exercises while she relaxed.

Today, however, she needed to preserve her energy, since she wouldn't eat breakfast and thus would require all the energy her sleep brought to her. That's why she'd chosen to avoid training, and why she'd neglected practicing chakra control that morning.

She wouldn't get the chakra back through breakfast and the control boost would be negligible at best, so it'd only be a net loss for the test that was about to take part.

Oh, well, at least she still had half an hour of relaxation left before the blonde bundle of energy, sunshine and cute would begin bothering her again. She tossed her book back into the cupboard and let out a contented sigh, closing her eyes and just letting her every muscle relax.

"Ne, Satchan, do you want me to wash your back?"

A moan of approval sounded through the bathroom as Satsuki leant forward and allowed enough space behind herself on the bathtub for another to slip in. The displacement of the water was the first sound that came to her ears, but she was too gone into her happy place to notice as she felt a pair of soft, soapy hands running through her back.

Another moan of approval left Satsuki's throat, as she leant forward a bit more to allow her massager more space to work with on her back and enjoy the fruits of her movements even further. The hands left her back for a few seconds, causing Satsuki to whimper at the loss. Then the hands returning, running from the base of her spine all the way up to her neck, before they began massaging her scalp.

Yet another moan escaped the bathing girl as the sensation ran through her body, her silky black locks parting way to give the hands access to her scalp. The one cleaning her hair began to hum a merry tune which Satsuki found rather soothing and calming as she slipped further into the bliss of full relaxation.

"Hm… your skin is so soft…" Satsuki didn't bother replying to the compliment, distracted by the jolt running through her body as the hands moved to her shoulders and upper back, massaging them to remove the kinks brought in from excessive training. Pressure was applied, and the Uchiha heiress winced when it became a bit too tough to bear, but it made the otherwise constant pains subside when the pressure relented.

The hands kneading her back made her feel like new after a while, and she couldn't help but whimper when they were once again removed from her body. "Ne, Satchan… can you wash my back too?"

"Sure…" Mumbled the Uchiha lost in her bliss. She turned around and looked at the damp, wavy locks that cascaded down her friend's back. Now that they were damp and actually being pulled down by their own weight, their length was perhaps even more impressive than her own hair's. Indeed, if she had to guess, she'd put them at a little more than waist length. Not entirely conductive to ninja work, but there were ways to counter that.

She knew so because there were many, many shinobi with long hair and she herself liked to keep her hair at least below her shoulders. Maybe it was just a misguided attempt to look like her mother.

Regardless, she parted the veritable sea of hair to get to the tanned skin of her target with one hand while looking for the bar of soap with the other. Finding it, she began to go through the act of removing the previous day's grime from the warm and wet body before her. It didn't take her long, as she didn't dwell upon the act more than she should.

"I think I missed a few spots, can you turn around?"

With a dumb nod and a rather mellow smile, Satsuki did as asked and then felt a pair of arms snake around her chest until they met each other and became intertwined. Something warm and soft pressed against her back and began to move up and down. A moan escaped Satsuki, a throaty sound brought from her rather pleasurable experience.

Whatever Naruto was doing felt rather good on her back and-

Wait a minute. "Naruto what the hell are you doing?" Asked Satsuki, as the haze from her relaxation wore of. The movements behind her back stopped at once.

"I'm washing your back, silly. Since I couldn't be sure with my hands, I thought I should use my whole body!" Explained a rather cheerful sounding voice.

"Um… That makes sense… I guess…" The Uchiha stated, rubbing her chin. Then she shook her head violently and groaned at her own stupidity for accepting that explanation. "That's not what I meant." While she might have been somewhat calm sounding, it was clear that her composure was at the border of breaking. "What are you doing in my bathroom? What are you doing in my bathtub while I am using it?"

"Oh, that. Well, I came here to pick you up so we could go to the training ground together, but since you weren't in your living room, I thought you might be here. And when I saw you, you looked so relaxed that I didn't want to interrupt your bath. Since I needed one myself, I thought that we could take a bath together to save time!" The rather lengthy explanation was given in the same obliviously cheerful and cheerfully oblivious tone that she delivered pretty much every sentence with.

Satsuki's palm met her face. "Let's… let's just get this over with…" She said. She was still a little in her happy place, and she wouldn't let Naruto being Naruto get in the way of it. She had to be ready and concentrated today, so it wasn't even a choice.

"Yay! Then, do I get to wash Satchan's front too?" Asked Naruto, a wide smile in her face.

Satsuki looked at Naruto as if she'd sprouted a second head.

(INSERTBREAKHERE!)

Naruto was skipping on her way, swinging a basket around as she went on her way. While she did so, she was humming a merry tune to herself. Trailing behind her, at a more sedate and controlled pace, were her teammates, Uchiha Satsuki and Haruno Sakura, the latter of which seemed to be seething and the former pointedly staring at the ground.

"Naruto, could you stop doing that?" Asked Sakura, looking at the twirling blonde with an abominable expression, trying her hardest to literally glare daggers at her. She had to content herself with just metaphorically glaring daggers at the object of her current rage.

"Doing what, Sakura-chan?" Asked Naruto, turning around and leaning forward, clasping her hands behind her back, using both to hold the basket in place.

"Jumping around. Your skirt is so short that every time you jump your panties show!" Explained the pinkette, crossing her arms and growling out her words.

Naruto unclasped her hands and brought her left index finger to her lower lip, falling into thought. "But I like moving around like this!" she said, pouting at Sakura.

Sakura groaned at the full frontal cuteness assault. "If you're going to do that, then you need to stop wearing a skirt. It's not a good idea to wear a skirt without a pair of shorts unless you want to show your underwear to everyone." The pinkette explained.

"But it's comfortable…" Naruto said, her pout intensified.

"It's distracting, Naruto." Ground out Satsuki, still glaring at the ground.

Her gaze travelled to where Naruto's feet lay. The sandals that covered her feet did nothing to hide her long black and orange stripped thigh high socks. Or maybe they were stockings? She didn't want to know. She forced her gaze away from the small strip of skin showed between Naruto's rather short skirt and the stockings, travelling up. Her only ninja-task worthy piece of clothing she wore was the black and orange jacket she wore. Indeed, her choice of dress was quite distracting for her teammates. "I know!" she said, a cheerful smile stretching her whiskered cheeks and her eyes closed, giving her the appearance of a fox kit.

Both Satsuki and Sakura groaned but said nothing about it.

"Why do you have a picnic basket with you?" Asked Sakura, finally managing to pull the question that had been on her mind since the two had picked her up. First, she looked at Satsuki, who merely shrugged as she hadn't even asked, then she looked directly at the blonde, who had been about to begin skipping down the path to training ground three once again. "Sensei told us not to eat breakfast." She said.

Naruto blushed and rubbed the back of her neck with her free hand. "I thought that sensei might be late today too, so I thought about it and decided we could have our breakfast as a picnic this morning!" She said, smiling at both of her teammates in a sheepish manner, which coupled with her blush out of embarrassment had them both thinking that she'd actually just made that up and she'd actually forgotten that their sensei had told them not to eat breakfast.

"How do you know that the training ground will even be conductive to having a picnic?" Asked Sakura, raising one eyebrow and managing to sound calm despite her irritation. "Now you'll have to carry that the whole day. And even if Sensei did come in late, there's still the fact that this could be a heavy training session and we would end up vomiting our breakfasts like he said." Talking about vomit was not how she envisioned her kunoichi days, but you take what you can. "You really should think these things through."

Naruto merely giggled as if that would somehow fix the problem.

Satsuki sighed and shook her head. "She may be right. If Sensei is as late as he was yesterday, then we'd have enough time for the food to settle in our stomachs before he gets there. We wouldn't be at risk of losing our breakfast then." She said, looking ahead, ignoring the eyes of everyone on the kunoichi trio. She knew they were an odd sight, as the classic formation for genin teams was two males and a female, but their class had been special, having more than the norm of females.

"If you think so…" Sakura said, biting her lower lip and keeping her remarks back.

It did not take long for the potential Team 7 to arrive at their teacher's chosen destination. The training ground he'd chosen for them was a wide open space with rather short grass and forest removing it from clear view by the village proper. It was not gigantic, but it was still one of the bigger training grounds in Konoha, and it made all three of them worry about what kind of test their sensei would put them through.

Naruto smirked and then opened her basket, pulling out a blanket that she'd used not too long ago. It was still clean enough, despite a few spots here and there, marks of its not inconsiderable age. With a flourish, she spread it on the grass, putting the basket in a corner and beginning to take out wrapped packages from within it.

Each and every one of them was quickly unwrapped to reveal many different kinds of sandwiches within them. "I didn't know what Sakura-chan liked, so I made a whole bunch of everything!" She explained, a wide smile in her face as she gestured to the incredible amount of food she'd spread on the blanket. "Please, dig in!"

Satsuki blinked, then sat in one of the two free corners. Naruto gestured to one of the plastic plates she'd set up with no less than twelve of the triangular treats.

"All of those have tomato in them, Satchan, I would've made more, but the youngest ones weren't ripe so I had to work with what I had." Explained the blonde. "Though I'm not sure which combinations you would like and which you wouldn't so…"

Satsuki shook her head. Naruto might not have been present, but ninja were taught to eliminate, or at least minimize, the list of the food that they didn't like. There was always the chance you'd have to eat things you usually wouldn't during missions, after all, or you could be asked to impersonate someone whose favorite food might be one you dislike.

It was just paranoia to most, but it was still useful at times to be capable of eating food regardless of its taste. A complicated art, to be sure, but a rewarding one. "It's weird that there's no instant ramen…" Satsuki muttered, having once been witness to the veritable mountains of empty ramen cups that Naruto threw out at a time. If she had to guess, she'd say that the blonde was keeping the industry alive on her lonesome.

"I wanted to bring some ramen cups, but since I no longer get the orphan's stipend, my ramen budget is a bit tight." Admitted Naruto, digging onto a random sandwich she picked up. "Eat up, Sakura-chan! You need to eat a lot so you will grow up nice and big!" the whiskered girl said, her eyes trailing down Sakura's rather androgynous body. Indeed, being twelve, she had yet to begin undergoing puberty and as such, could be confused with a boy except for her long hair.

And so, Team Seven spent their early morning amicably eating their picnic breakfast, chatting about inconsequential things that almost invariably ended up being sidetracked by a perverted comment coming from the blonde.

"Anyway, what happened this morning? You two came together…"

"Well, it's a long story, but I guess we have time." Naruto said, shrugging. "It all begins when I went to pick up Satchan…" And such a very long tale that explained in thorough detail each and every one of the actions Naruto had performed, up to and including the bath she'd taken, was told to an increasingly redder Sakura.

Not to be left behind, Satsuki sported a luminescent blush, being reduced to dumb nodding whenever Sakura asked for confirmation.

Sakura groaned. "You're BOTH perverts…" She muttered.

"Aw, Sakura-chan is jealous! Next time, we should all take a bath together! I have a large enough furo in my apartment we can use! No, wait, I've got a better idea! We should go to the hot springs!"

Against her better judgment, Sakura shrugged. "Sure, why not?" She said.

* * *

More fanservice for the sake of fanservice. Mmmkay. I believe it's a good enough purpose, anyway.


	4. Hot Examination

"You're late, sensei." Said Sakura, stifling the need to yell.

Kakashi raised an eyebrow, then smiled as he saw the little bundle of fun and sunshine curled up in a blanket. This would have been an adorable image on its own, except that it seemed that at some point the blonde has climbed onto Satsuki's lap and made herself comfortable there.

The Uchiha girl herself seemed to pay no mind to Kakashi's flashy shunshin entrance, entranced as she was with massaging Naruto's scalp through the sea of golden hair. There was a small smile on the Ice Princess' face, so small as to be almost unnoticeable.

"You should wake her up." Kakashi said, keeping his voice low so as to not disturb the blonde's sleep himself. Even he couldn't quite bring himself to give her a rude awakening. "Satsuki…" he said, focusing his lone eye on the Uchiha.

The Uchiha turned to him. "She finally shut up." Said the irritated girl, glaring at the silver haired jounin as if he'd just insulted her entire clan. "We'll keep her this way, even if I have to carry her on my back through the entirety of this exam." The sheer resolution and conviction in her words almost, read ALMOST, made Kakashi consider letting her go through with that.

Almost.

Sakura looked at Satsuki weirdly. "… Satsuki-san…" the pinkette turned around so that she was giving her back to her teammates and sensei . "She's just as clingy…"

Satsuki probably hadn't heard her, concentrated as she was on humming a soothing tune and continuing her ministrations on her blonde teammate's sleeping body, lest she wake up from her nap and break the peace. Kakashi, however, was quite attentive and alert and had therefore picked up Sakura's words.

So alert was he that he even picked up the envy in Sakura's tone. He wanted, so bad, to giggle in the way that only Icha Icha could make him giggle… His team was turning out more interesting by the minute. The fact that he'd found them having a picnic was only a further plus. Without making a single noise, Kakashi moved faster than their eyes could track until he was behind the unwitting Uchiha.

With fluid and fast movements, he extracted the sleeping blonde from the Uchiha's hold and did it in so smooth a manner that the blonde herself seemed completely unaware of the change in position until she stirred slightly from contact with Kakashi's rather tough jounin vest. Her confused pawing at his chest found her snuggling against it, once she made herself comfortable in his arms.

He really did love the girl he saw as a little sister and thus he had to reign in the creeping need to bully her. Being so adorable made him want to harass her just to see her pout about it. "Wake up sleepy one…" Kakashi muttered, poking her in the forehead and cheeks. Her face turned to one of discomfort rather than content and she tried to slap the hand away. "Wake up, Naruto… I've got ramen for you."

The girl quickly blinked herself back to awareness. Or rather, failed to do so despite trying admirably. "Don' wanna…" She mumbled. "Wake up…" She added, directing a half lidded, sleepy stare at where Kakashi was looking down with a smile on his face. Meaning, that weird eye-smile thing he did. "Feed me, inu-niisan…" she mumbled.

"Just wake up already!" Yelled Sakura, causing Naruto to yelp and, since she wasn't aware she was currently tied into a bundle of blankets and in her teacher's arms, when she tried to sit up she only managed to somehow jump out of Kakashi's arms. Her face met the ground shortly after wards, which happened because her arms were held back by the blankets keeping her warm and cozy.

She quickly shot into a seating position, rubbing her nose while making pained sounds that were only made funnier by the fact that they sounded nasally obnoxious and hilarious. "Poot. I was having the bestest dream ever!" she declared, glaring at her team and teacher and falling into an expression that she must have thought was intimidating, yet only managed to make everyone laugh.

"Well, now that everyone is awake, I'll explain the terms of this test so we can speed this up. The objective of this test is… these!" He said, producing a pair of silver bells from right the fuck outta nowhere. "You see, this is something called the Bell Test, it goes all the way back to our Sandaime Hokage. The objective is very simple, really. Take these bells from me. However you can. Nothing is forbidden. Everything is permitted. There are bonus points if you manage to kill me while at it." Explained the silver haired jounin. "So come at me with the intent to kill when you're trying to get these." He said, lifting the bells again and causing them to jingle.

Sakura raised an eyebrow. "What? But… Sensei, there are only two bells!"

"This is nice. At least one of my cute little genin can count." Said Kakashi, offering Sakura a smile behind his mask and leaning down, slightly scaring the pink haired genin. "Only two can pass this test. One of you is invariably going to fail."

"Hey! That's not fair! We've all worked really hard to get here!" Naruto yelled. Her glare was focused on the solitary eye Kakashi showed. The Hatake could understand her reaction, as it was mostly brought out from fear of failing. Unlike the other two, she was not certain she could graduate again should she fail.

"That's how it works." Explained the silver haired jackass. "Any other questions?" Seeing as how his team was still petrified, he merely smiled and jumped away, landing a good dozen meters away from them. "Behind you is an alarm clock set for noon." They immediately turned around to notice that, indeed, there was a clock that they'd never seen him set. Kakashi reigned in a chuckle. "If none of you has a bell by then, you will all fail."

"I won't fail." Said Satsuki, solemn and serious, glaring at Kakashi.

"I'm sure you will." Kakashi said. "Now… Go!"

Immediately, Satsuki and Sakura disappeared, both retreating into the woods, believing their abilities to hide enough to fool someone of Kakashi's caliber. Sometimes, genin were just too cute. He smiled at the one who was just there. Either she realized hiding was pointless or she just decided she wanted to try first. It didn't matter to Kakashi, either way.

"I'll beat you!" Said the blonde girl, glaring and pointing at the silver haired man.

"Sure you will." Kakashi muttered, his hand immediately going for his pouch where his favorite book rested. With an absent minded smile, he waved at her. "Come at me." He didn't even need to look at her to hear the sound of her footsteps. He didn't even need the slightest bit of concentration on her movements.

She telegraphed them minutes in advance. Heck, he could tell you what all of her movements would be before she even tried them. She tried a whole arrangement of different movements, all of them executed in a rather poor, sloppy manner that had her over extended after each and every movement, which in turn made her follow ups even worse than they would be under her laughable skill.

She should never have graduated. As she was, a second year academy student would beat her in a hand to hand battle. "Ninja lesson number one." Kakashi intoned, sounding bored. "Taijutsu." He added.

Naruto growled as Kakashi quickly and swiftly dodged every single attack she threw at him. Even making use of her better than average flexibility and not inconsiderable speed, she couldn't even force him to tear his eyes away from that damnable book.

"If your opponent can dodge everything you do, you're doing something wrong." Explained Kakashi. "A simple tip to help you in the future." He said, as Naruto threw a wide, sweeping kick that he ducked under. Normally, that'd be impossible, given how short she was, but she had actually jumped to reach his head. She kicked with so much strength that she actually couldn't stop herself from fully spinning. Kakashi's right hand, the one that wasn't holding his Icha Icha, went to Naruto's shoulder, in easy reach due to being crouched.

She almost hit the ground face first at being suddenly grounded, but managed to keep on her feet.

"And now we go to ninja lesson number two. Never reveal your back to your opponent." He said, and he saw Naruto begin to sweat at the implications. "With that, let me continue onto ninja lesson number three. The Nidaime made many techniques. Many of them sound dumb at first glance."

Naruto once again tried to kick him, except this time the spin kick was intentional…

… Only to find that Kakashi wasn't behind her anymore.

"But there is no technique the Nidaime made that is not extremely useful in the right situation."

As he said that, he pocketed his book and then his hands met each other. He made a single hand seal, Tiger, and then put his hands together into a gun-like shape. "Konoha Hiden Ninpou: Sennen Goroshi (Konoha Hidden Legendary Ninja Art: One thousand years of death)!"

He rammed his hands forward and Naruto yelled out in terror as she realized that they were heading to her unprotected behind. She prepared herself for unimaginable pain and braced herself.

Except that Kakashi's hands never reached her butt. She heard a sound as if somebody had struck a piece of meat with a hammer and she saw Kakashi's form go flying away. "Satchan came to my rescue!" She cried happily, smiling at the safety of her butt.

Satsuki glared at the silver haired man who'd landed on a heap. She didn't know why she'd broken her cover, or why she was seeing red and focusing on her sudden yet undying hatred of her teacher. Her hand went to grab Naruto's jacket and then she pulled her up, the hand that had lifted her now around her waist and, more importantly, keeping her skirt down. "MINE!" she yelled, glaring at the man who was now picking himself up.

The man began to laugh at seeing this display, and seeing the now self conscious potential kunoichi, he only laughed harder. "Aw… Satchan really likes Naru-chan?" Asked the jounin.

Satsuki's face was covered by red and she quickly tossed the blonde away.

"That hurt!" Cried the blonde who had landed on her butt. "What is it with you people and my ass?" she said, sounding irritated about that fact while standing up and rubbing her poor abused behind.

"Well, one or two doesn't make a difference. Come at me gals!"

Satsuki grunted, controlled her blush and then snapped into action. Moving far faster than Naruto had at any time, she instantly closed the distance between her and her teacher, engaging in melee with the jounin. She actually prevented him from pulling the book out, actually forcing him to parry and block instead of just dodging everything.

Naruto knew she was outclassed. As much as she hated to admit it, she knew perfectly well that she couldn't even put a scratch on either her teacher or her potential teammate. Still, she let her anger at being treated like a joke get the better of her and she jumped into the fray.

She tried a rather dynamic entrance, copying Satsuki's earlier interruption. Except when she tried it, Kakashi was perfectly aware of her movements. She was also significantly slower than Satsuki, so it was tremendously easy for him to catch her kick before it hit him. Naruto's rage ebbed, and she whimpered as she realized her rather precarious position.

Satsuki's face twisted into a grimace as she noticed Kakashi's intentions, as well, and she braced herself. She was perfectly correct in doing so as Kakashi used the age old tried and true technique of causing grievous bodily harm utilizing a genin as a weapon.

He let go of Naruto's ankle just as she was about to impact Sasuke, causing what could've been a simple attack to turn into an attack that left Satsuki holding a human body and weighing her down, as she'd actually caught her teammate rather than just block the attack.

Naruto found herself carried bridal style by her teammate. "Hi Satchan!" She said, waving and looking up at the girl. The Uchiha blushed and threw the blonde away. Predictably, she landed on her ass once again. "This time it didn't hurt." She remarked as she stood up, dusting her skirt off.

"I'm not going to let this indignity slide..!" Satsuki managed to somehow sound as if she was muttering while talking loudly. Her hands met and she began to blaze through handsigns memorized from years of practice.

"Hm? You've got that much chakra?" Asked the silver haired jounin.

"Katon: Goukakyuu No Jutsu(Fire Release: Grand Fireball)!" cried the Uchiha, pushing fiery chakra-fueled fire out from her mouth. Great amounts of chakra went into fueling the massive fireball that crashed down on the perfectly still jounin teacher. She poured chakra until she was certain that there was nothing that could've survived the fireball.

She let go and panted, falling to one knee and using her hand to keep herself from crashing to the ground. All that was left on the ground was a big patch of burnt grass. She cursed, as Kakashi could have gone away in any direction. Luckily, it was the big clearing in the center of the training ground, and therefore there was a big and wide swat of open space that meant that Kakashi couldn't try a hidden approach.

She began frantically looking around, but the only thing with her in the clearing was the orange wearing blonde who seemed to be utterly and thoroughly confused. And impressed.

A pair of hands sprouted from out of the ground, one of them grabbing onto each of Satsuki's bare ankles. Instants later, she was pulled into the ground, burying her up to the neck. She let out a confused and pained gasp, the pressure was decidedly not being nice on her body. Kakashi appeared from under the ground, smirking under his mask. Satsuki directed a glacial glare at him.

Kakashi merely continued to smirk, tilting his head back to completely avoid the incoming punch from Naruto, causing the girl to gasp in shock as she overshot her target, having jumped with all her strength to deliver a devastating blow to his cheek and failing at that miserably. Kakashi grabbed her extended arm before she could even try to salvage her attack into an elbow strike, spinning around once and getting rid of her momentum, leaving her hanging on the air.

"Ah, crap!" With his own gained momentum, Kakashi lifted his leg and smashed it into her gut, sending her flying away. Satsuki hadn't even noticed the small pond that Naruto landed in before the water exploded upwards from her sinking.

"I wonder… does she know how to swim?" Asked Kakashi, absent mindedly. "Oh, well, if she drowns, we'll know." He added, smiling faintly. "Well, I guess I'll go look for Sakura and see if she wants to even try."

Saying that, the silver haired jounin simply walked away like a boss, into the forest Sakura had retreated into.

Incidentally, Sakura was no longer hiding in the forest. In fact, she had actually utilized the time Kakashi wandered into the forest reading his book to approach her teammates. First she headed to the small pond. Naruto was on its shore, busy coughing out the water that had gotten into her lungs from her most recent tumble.

Sakura chose to ignore how her teammate's backside was revealed to the world. That way laid trouble. With a grimace, she helped the girl to her feet. "Come on, we have to help Satsuki before Sensei gets back here."

Naruto sighed, running a hand through the big mass of wet hair trailing behind her, noticing how mud, a few sticks and countless leaves, the trash that had littered the pond, were now sticking to it. Steeling herself, she shook her head quickly, and the hair trailing behind her followed, massive amounts of water and trash being removed from the golden mane. When she finished doing so, a good fifteen seconds after she'd started, her hair was surprisingly clean.

She'd had it all throughout the academy. Sakura just guessed that having it for so long meant that she'd found some way to negate the disadvantages. A special technique to shake the dirt and trash off it was something that Naruto would come up with, probably.

She sighed, regardless.

The dirt surrounding Satsuki was surprisingly soft, so much so that it was pathetically easy to dig her out using their kunai and bare hands. It only took a few minutes when it should have taken them hours. It made sense that the jutsu had loosened up the earth, after all, the pressure would've probably crushed Satsuki's squishier bits otherwise. It was a capture technique, not an assassination one, it seemed.

"Okay. I watched that fight and… there's just no way we're gonna beat Kakashi-sensei in direct combat. There has to be some trick to this test. It's just too… randomly cruel to do something like this." Sakura explained.

"I concur." Satsuki said, nodding at the pinkette. "But it's an individual test, sharing our knowledge would be counterproductive."

Naruto looked at the ground intently for a few seconds before sighing. "That is just stupid and so totally like you, Satchan!" said Naruto, pouting. "Why should we keep our thoughts from each other? Just so that we don't figure out a way to beat the test before you?" She said, actually bopping the girl on top of her head, causing her to give an astonished stare at the blonde who had the sheer balls to hit her. "This is obviously trying to turn us against each other and you're the only one who's falling for it."

"I can't believe I'm agreeing on something with Naruto…" Sakura muttered, rubbing the bridge of her nose. "… But she's right. If we teamed up, we may have a chance…"

"No." Satsuki said, shaking her head. "Neither of you two would be able to put a hand on me in a spar, and I could only hit Kakashi once because he was distracted. Even all three of us together wouldn't be able to beat him. Not without a secret trump card." Said Satsuki, after a few seconds of meditating on the information she'd been given. She completely failed to acknowledge her prior logical error and continued with all the poise and absolute coolness that only the Ice Princess could muster.

"I hate to say this but… Naruto, you're the unpredictable one here… any ideas?" Sakura said, turning to the blonde who tapped her chin in thought. "We don't have that much time before Kakashi-sensei figures out I'm no longer in the forest. I left traces of my perfume all over it, but he's bound to pick up the trail back here eventually."

Naruto nodded to herself, then a smile appeared on her face. It was not a nice smile. In fact, so creepy was it that it caused both of the other girls in the clearing to shiver in fright, recognizing the look of glee in the blonde's face. "I've got just the jutsu for this task, but I'll need your help! Kakashi-sensei is a jounin, so he may be able to resist it if I use it on my own!"

Sakura blinked. "Is it some kind of torture jutsu?" she asked.

"… You could say that." The blonde said, her smile widening. "Though some say that it's the most wonderful torture they've been under…"

"For some reason, I fear for my innocence." Satsuki said, looking at Sakura and managing to do so with a perfectly straight and serious face.

"So do I, Satsuki, so do I." answered Sakura, not bothering to hide her nervousness.

"Okay, here's how you do it…"

It was a few minutes later that Kakashi, who had been randomly walking around the forest (of course he knew exactly where Sakura was at any given point of time this exam had started, he was a jounin for a reason, he'd just been humoring the girl, as the thing with the perfume WAS clever) while reading his book, found his team all sitting together. "You're ready to give up, then?"

Naruto smiled for an instant, but then her face changed to one of sadness. "Uhm… Sensei, could we please have the bells?" Naruto asked, grabbing both of her teammates and pulling them into one armed hugs. The pout and kicked puppy eyes, coupled with the tears threatening to spill from her eyes, ALMOST convinced Kakashi to give her a bell.

"That's not gonna work, Naruto-chan." But of course Kakashi had dealt with those for years and had built an immunity to them (Even though in every festival he ended up accompanying her to he always ended up spending close to a month's pay on buying her everything she asked for, it was just his luck that prevented the girl from connecting Inu to him up until now, even if she subconsciously knew they were one and the same).

"Bummer." Naruto said, sighing. "Oh, well, I tried Plan B, girls. It's time to deploy the big guns, now."

Now this was getting interesting. They had gotten the point of the test pretty easily, contrasting with every other team he'd had up until now. Then again, those teams were made intentionally so they would fail and given to a sensei who was trying to fail them in the first place, so it was not as if this was something to be proud of. "I'm curious what you can pull off. Remember, only two can pass!" He reminded them.

"We'll deal with that as it comes." Naruto said, shrugging.

"Rock paper scissors." Sakura helpfully commented.

Satsuki looked away, a slight blush on her face. This caused Kakashi to hide a smile. Whatever plan they were going to use would probably have a weak link on the seemingly unwilling Uchiha. He'd pounce on that, maybe humble her a bit while he's on the job.

"Anyway… It's time to end this test! Now!"

As one, they began to go through a rather short series of hand signs. The chain was instantly recalled by Kakashi's brain as he quickly made the connection to the blonde's version of the henge. He wondered what they were trying to accomplish.

"Oiroke Ninpou: San Yuri no Jutsu (Sexy Ninja Art: Three Lilies)!" the three cried in unison, causing Kakashi to blink. Then the smoke dispelled, three gorgeous displays of the female form being overly affectionate to each other. Kakashi blinked again. Yep. They were still there. The buxom blonde in the middle had a hand around each of the other girls' waists, pulling them close to herself and pressing their bodies together while she stared at Kakashi with an unmistakably sultry look that screamed overflowing sexuality.

The sheer sight of the blonde babe alone could've made any man weak at the knees. Every part of her body was perfect. There were simply no words in the thesaurus that could describe the sight. No words in the human language could convey the experience, either. Kakashi had to use all of his training that taught him how to not be seduced (particularly important on elite jounin such as him) to not fall right then and there with a nosebleed.

On contrast, the other two were flushed and embarrassed, awkwardly clinging to the blonde for support, clearly scared of the act they were doing. This should have broken the illusion that they were pulling off, but in this particular case, it only made it ever stronger. The act was just too perfect.

The blonde took a few steps forward, pulling the two others along with her, until she was in Kakashi's personal space. Despite the boosted height, she only managed to meet him face to chin. Using her arms, she pushed the pinkette and raven haired girls closer to Kakashi, making them press against each of his arms.

Kakashi was utterly paralyzed and it took all of his self control to not let his arms snake to places they shouldn't go.

"Mhm… Kakashi-sensei…" There was such need, such overblown need, in her tone that Kakashi found himself physically pushed back by his own resistance to it. The three girls crashed to the ground with him, the buxom blonde landing on top of him. Her breasts dangled in front of his face and Kakashi felt the ache in his pants. "Hm… What do we want… girls?" she asked, as the other two pressed themselves against the sides of Kakashi's chest, unwittingly pushing him further by letting their hot breaths out while too close to his skin.

"We… We want him…" they began, hindered by their own embarrassment.

"Yes, yes, sensei, we want you-"

But by then, Kakashi was in happy dreamland, having passed out from the sheer sexual tension in the air.

"- to pass us three!" Naruto declared, smiling down at the man…

… Only to find him passed out on the ground.

"… I guess that counts as a yes?" Naruto said, shrugging.

_Meanwhile, in the Hokage's office…_

"Lucky son of a bitch…"

"Observing Kakashi's test was the best idea ever, Hiruzen."

"Indeed, I agree with Homura. I don't know how we could ever doubt your ability to lead us."

"You three are a disgrace to Shinobi everywhere. Fucking perverts…"


	5. Sunny Yandere

They say hindsight is 20/20. Well, it is, since you can see why what you did was stupid in hindsight. Therefore, one certain Uchiha Satsuki could honestly say that, in hindsight, walking alone when there ain't one single light on one of the more narrow streets of Konoha, where there were many dark and dank alleys, was a terrible idea.

Then again, she had nothing to fear from anyone that lurked the night. After all, she was a kunoichi, and pretty much the first thing that they learned was how to inflict insane amounts of pain to potential rapists. Mostly because their teacher in the art of kunoichi (which had later been adopted as the name for female ninja due to the predilection of them going into the career, even though, humorously, there were actually male kunoichi), one Suzume by name, just so happened to be more combat oriented than what would have been ideal for kunoichi classes.

Sometimes, Satsuki wondered why boys rarely took them. Kunoichi classes, unlike what was usually thought, taught a lot of important infiltration stuff, a lot of useful little things that most took for granted that could help you go unnoticed. That and they were also surprisingly fun at times.

That one year they'd had that Anko lady teaching had been the most entertaining year by far. Then again, the woman was a bit more practical than Suzume (and more graphical in her descriptions) as well as more focused on the actual kunoichi stuff rather than overall infiltration. Fun things such as convincing someone, man or woman, to hand over their secrets just with your tongue.

What she had meant had, at the time of her describing it, flown right over their heads. Satsuki was certain Naruto still hadn't gotten the pun. She could be dumb like that.

Getting back on track, Satsuki really should've thought better of walking during the night. The problem came not from civilians attempting to 'get back' at one of the proud kunoichi of the leaf, no. The threat a civilian posed at any time was laughable at best. They were only a danger when the ninja was trying to remain low profile.

The trouble would come from a fellow kunoichi, in fact. A rather pissed off one, at that.

Then again, who can blame Satsuki for not expecting the events of that night? After all, who could expect sweet, meek and shy little Hinata-chan to be out after dark? Who would have expected that after a grunted greeting, the girl would get right in her way?

"You're in my way." Said the Uchiha, blinking.

"Yes. I am aware of that." Hinata replied, folding her hands behind her back. "We have to talk, Uchiha-san."

She hadn't stuttered. Hinata ALWAYS stuttered. She hadn't even stumbled on her words. This was an absolute shocker coming from the girl who couldn't go for an entire sentence without changing her choice of words thrice or doubting the veracity of her own statements even when she was quoting the book verbatim. "At this time?" The Ice Princess was confused, yes, but nothing that would break her composure.

"This time would be best. I am actually glad to have such a chance to speak with you away from prying eyes." Spoke the Hyuuga softly, keeping her tone even and calm. "Would you kindly follow me?" she asked.

Seeing no real threat, after all the Hyuuga girl had been middle of the pack at best, she decided, sure, why the hell not? A simple nod had the issue straightened out as Hinata walked into an alley off the side that was devoid of any form of trash or anything living, for that matter.

"What do you wish to speak about?" Being perfectly formal yet somehow incredibly insulting was an Uchiha trait that the only loyal Uchiha had mastered. Something about the tone in which you said things just pissed people off somehow, and Satsuki knew this very well. The reason why she was intentionally doing it when speaking to the Hyuuga girl was…

… She didn't really like her very much.

First, she was a Hyuuga. Their families had such an ancient feud that it had lasted longer than their feud with the Senju, which had been settled with the birth of Konoha while the Hyuuga and Uchiha had never really stopped hating each other. Satsuki blamed it on Doujutsu envy.

Second, the girl simply disgusted her due to how weak she was. Uchiha Satsuki prided herself on being a strong, capable and independent woman, while Hyuuga Hinata was, in her eyes, the complete opposite to that, what with being a poor little flower in danger of wilting if you yell too hard.

Let it not go unsaid that Satsuki hated weak men just as much.

She just hated weakness in general. Most importantly, her own, but her own denial would never let her admit her own weaknesses.

"Are you just going to waste my time?" Asked the Uchiha, glaring at the girl who looked around and seemed to deign the barely lit alley worthy of the conversation she wished to have.

"I wish to waste neither of our times. I have much to do." Hinata explained, turning back to Satsuki and surprising her with the sheer hate that her usually meek demeanor hid so well. She had never known Hinata could ever be scary, but the sheer amount of hate behind that glare almost made Satsuki stumble.

It distracted her long enough that she never saw Hinata's arm move until it was buried in her gut. No chakra enhancement. No open palm attack. Just a regular punch to the Solar Plexus, almost knocking her out right then and there and driving all air from her lungs out. "Now, this will not be a conversation, Uchiha-san. A conversation implies both parties speak. This? This will be more like a monologue."

Satsuki was too busy trying to recover her lost breath to counter that statement, and she didn't even have time to prevent Hinata from grabbing her hair and forcing her to look up.

"I will talk, and you will listen, okay?" She said, forcefully making the defiant Uchiha nod. "That's a good girl. Now, you might be wondering just what this is all about." She began, as her right hand, the one that was free, flew to the tenketsu on her shoulders, disabling her arms, and then to the ones around her waist, disabling her legs and leaving her defenseless. "Well, this is really simple."

"What… The fuck…" Satsuki gasped out, almost unconscious from the sheer pain that the sudden and brutal assault had left her in.

"For some reason, in her infinite kindness Naruto-chan decided that she likes you." The Hyuuga heiress spoke, lifting Satsuki so they were face to face. "Naruto-chan is very special to me. When nobody wanted to give me a hand, she was there to pick me up. When everyone did their best to knock me to the ground, she was always supporting me. Even before she even took notice of my existence, she has always been the strength that held me together. Her smile has always been the priceless jewel that lights up my dreary life." She said, smiling fondly at the memory of the blonde.

Satsuki found herself mystified. She'd never seen the two girls hang out. Then again, she only registered Naruto's existence when the girl was annoying the living daylights out of her. And despite what she might say, Naruto wasn't constantly annoying her. She annoyed other people too. And apparently she also found time to be Hinata's source of strength.

Maybe that was what she did when she wasn't annoying Satsuki herself.

"Like I said, Naruto-chan found a place in her heart that she dedicated to you." The Hyuuga repeated, pulling Satsuki's hair back and causing her to grimace in pain. "Naruto-chan might forget and forgive any and all offences… But I won't. I won't forget, and I won't forgive you if you do anything to cause her pain." She said, smiling in a sinister manner only made worse by the fact that it seemed as if she were a gentle, kind and caring soul instead of this creature that was frightening the last Uchiha.

"Tche! You don't scare me!" She said, her voice now recovered to its usual frigid and menacing tone. Satsuki was a master at appearing in control even when she was not, it seemed. However, Hinata was far from intimidated, sneering at the angry Uchiha.

"You don't seem to understand your situation here." Hinata stated, slapping Satsuki and causing her to give an indignant, pained glare. "Let me put this in the simplest of ways so you can understand this, Uchiha."

There was a few seconds of silence as Hinata steeled her face into the most abominable expression a human being can make. It genuinely made the Uchiha scared, if only because it was the usually kind and gentle Hinata making it. The Hyuuga grabbed Satsuki's neck and then slammed her against the closest wall, holding her above the ground with one single hand.

There was nothing Satsuki could do to free herself, as her limbs would be locked for a few more minutes by Hinata's precise Jyuuken strikes.

"If you dare to break Naruto-chan's heart… I will break yours." She said, closing the distance between their faces to the point that the only thing they could see was each other's eyes. "Except when I do it, it will be a lot messier. Do you understand what I'm telling you, Uchiha-san?"

Satsuki growled. "You won't scare me! You have no idea who you're dealing with!" The Uchiha's composure was finally blown and she was left as an almost snarling angry yet impotent little girl.

Hinata smashed her against the wall again. A massive shock of pain rang through the taller girl's chakra system, causing her to yelp in agony. She could have screamed, brought along assistance… but both of them knew that she never would. She'd never accept that she had been so easily outwitted and bested. She'd never show this much weakness.

And Hinata had made use of that fact.

"What are your dreams, Uchiha-san? Destroying your elder brother and resurrecting your clan, aren't they?" The Uchiha remained perfectly silent, not revealing her anger or surprise at the fact that the Hyuuga had such knowledge of her. "The Jyuuken is a very versatile style. I can do many things with it. All sorts of things that the majority of the population doesn't know it can do." She explained, smiling widely. "I can cancel the flow of chakra through your limbs and render them useless temporarily or… I can make them useless permanently. The only difference is in the shape of the chakra spike I use to do it. All I need to do it is to just tap you and my chakra will do the rest. The chakra scalpel is based on the principles behind the Jyuuken, did you know that?" She asked. "It's just as easy for me to damage your tenketsu as it is for me to damage your physical body. I know my anatomy well enough to know where your uterus is."

Hinata said that as her hand snuck under Satsuki's blue shirt and she placed it against where her waist began. "Wh-What are you-"

"Hm… So fragile. Right now, I could have rendered you infertile just like that." Hinata explained. "And those are both your dreams, down the crapper." Hinata was dissonantly cheerful as she said that. "I assure you, I can, and I will ruin your life if you break Naruto-chan's heart."

Satsuki was finally allowed to crash into a heap, laying against the ground and wall. She didn't even have the will to be angry.

No. She was too terrified, and shocked, to have the slightest reaction when Hinata crouched down and placed a peck on her cheek, smiling widely at her. "But you won't do that, right? Naruto-chan is sometimes too cute for her own good, and I fear what this ugly, ugly world might do to someone as pure and innocent as she is…"

"Pure and innocent?" Satsuki blurted out, completely beyond coherent thought at this point and just reacting to something she found utterly ludicrous.

"Ah, yes, you let yourself be deluded by her perverted attitude. Such a shallow fool, really, I wonder what she sees in you?" She asked. "Well, you are reasonably pretty, I guess, and you do blush cutely." She said, noticing Satsuki's face going through those same motions, despite the girl herself currently responding only by instinct. "Ah, well, the point is, Naruto-chan doesn't understand why acting the way she acts would be wrong. And to be frank… I believe she is right to act the way she does. Why should we repress our feelings? Why should we conform to be what society wants us to be?"

Satsuki growled. "So it's just that she doesn't care what others think about? Neither do I and you don't see me flashing my underwear to everyone!" she declared, her anger taking over her fear for the moment. She was beginning to regain the flow of chakra to her limbs and the feeling that came with it.

Her calm mind had taken over once again. She was intentionally trying to lure Hinata into lengthening the conversation. She would never, ever lower herself into calling for help… and she would prove that she needed no one's help to defend herself by turning this situation around.

Hinata sighed. "It's not that simple. You may believe you don't care what others think of you, but you do." She explained. "You train as hard as you do because everyone expects you to be a genius, befitting the noble Uchiha clan. You are cold and distant because that's what everyone expects you to be. You act the way you do because that's the way people wanted you to act and you never knew anything else."

Satsuki actually stopped to think for a few seconds before shaking her head, which was difficult given her body was still mostly numb from the chakra shock Hinata had given her earlier. "Don't be ridiculous. All my life I've had people tell me that I should be more open, that I should share my burdens! I am strong enough to shoulder them myself! I don't need anybody to tell me what to do! Not you, not a councilor, no one!" She snarled, glaring at the Hyuuga girl who only looked at her with pity.

"That's where you're wrong… but discussing that with you is pointless. You'd never listen if the words came from my mouth. Perhaps somebody will get through to you in time… Before you do something you will regret. I dearly hope so. I wouldn't want Naruto-chan to be sad because you followed the dark path you've been set upon to its distasteful conclusion." Explained the white eyed girl, shaking her head as if she was truly feeling bad about it.

"Who do you think you are, Hyuuga?! Who gave you the right to decide if I am right or wrong in the path that I chose for my life?" asked the kunoichi of the year.

"Me? I'm nobody important to you." She said, shrugging. "To be frank, under normal circumstances, you could go and kill yourself for all I would care. I literally couldn't care less about the ancient clan rivalries. Personally, the only reason I don't like you is because you're a frigid bitch. Maybe once you pull your head out of your ass, we can even be friends." Hinata explained. "In these specific circumstances, however… You have in your hands something that is more precious to me than anything else in the world. Something that I've always done my hardest to keep safe and protected at all costs. You, Uchiha Satsuki, have in your hands Naruto-chan's heart. From the moment that she decided to like you, your well being became my business."

Satsuki merely glared at the Hyuuga, who smiled widely at her.

"I'm glad we had this conversation. A monologue would've been rather boring." She said, apparently thinking back. "Now, I know that you are a smart girl and that you will think things through now that I've told you where you stand." Hinata then crouched so she was at eye level with the Uchiha again, then she placed a quick peck on her cheek. "Of course, Naruto-chan is happy if you're happy. If Naruto-chan is happy, so am I. Therefore, I have a vested interest in your happiness. I wouldn't dream of harming you, and it really pains me to have to do this, but I really must stress the seriousness of my words."

"You… you're insane." Satsuki finally summarized.

Hinata tapped her lower lip in a manner reminiscent of Naruto and then giggled, the sound contrasting with the dreary atmosphere of the alley like black next to white. "Perhaps I am. But then again, what good ninja is not the least bit insane?" she said, winking at her. "We'll see each other around, I guess. Now, I believe I have an appointment with your other teammate, Sakura."

"What the… you're going to assault Sakura too!" Satsuki said, glaring at the girl.

Just a few seconds more. She'd regain the feeling in her arms enough to overpower Hinata, beat her up and bring her to the authorities so they could see how crazy the Hyuuga was.

"Assault her?" Hinata asked, tilting her head. "Now why would I do something like that? Sakura appears to be a smart girl who can understand spoken words. She also isn't hell bent on following a self-destructive path that will hurt her and everyone who cares about and loves her. Good night, Uchiha-san. Oh, and I'd prefer if you kept this little conversation away from Naruto-chan's ears. She really could do with less heartache in her life."

Satsuki merely grunted, a non committal sound that had Hinata smirking before she vanished into the night. The Uchiha recovered the feeling in her body too late to stop the girl from escaping, and she let out a soft curse before punching the ground in anger and frustration.

Again. Again she'd been reduced to a hopeless, useless and helpless little child being talked down to. She hadn't advanced at all. She had thought she'd grown beyond that… but Hinata had just proven she was still a naïve, trusting little moron. She seethed internally, trying her hardest not to let her anger and frustration show.

It was a futile effort, but in the dark and cold of the night, nobody saw the tears spill.

* * *

That's two chapters I made within the span of twelve hours. Granted, it's just something like 7600 words between the two of them, but hey, it's still two chapters! Chapter two was almost 50% longer than the usual chapters. The Bell Test got WAAAAAAAAAAY out of hand there. So much so that I had to cut Sakura's interference lest it begin to drag. Then again, it would've amounted to nothing in the end and I like to make Sakura smart enough to realize she's got no chance in hell against Kakashi. I also got away with making her smarter than a brick and taking advantage of an usual perceived weakness of hers (IE, using perfume) by showing that you can also use it in other ways.

Now this is my response to anyone who's wondering whether or not Hinata crushes on a female Naruto. The following few paragraphs will be an unnecessarily long essay on my thoughts on the NaruHina pairing. Some might be shocked with it if they go forewarned into it knowing that not only is it not my favorite pairing, I don't even ship them. I'd rather have Naruto get together with someone who would reign him in. He sorely needs it.

Anyway, on towards the thing. I will begin by explaining what prompted this. This was prompted by discovering that in many of the fics in which Naruto is genderbent, Hinata ends up crushing on Kiba. Now, the pairing on its own I won't say anything about, you can like them or not, but my point is that with the canon circumstances and characteristics, that pairing just would not work. People tend to believe that the reason that Hinata crushes on Naruto is because of his goofy, happy go lucky and cheerful personality. That is only a part of the reason why Hinata is so smitten with Naruto and that alone is not enough to sell her on everyone's favorite blond idiot.

The reason that Hinata crushes on Naruto lies on Naruto's circumstances and how he acts upon them. Hinata doesn't crush on Naruto because he is always smiling and having fun. Hinata crushes on Naruto because he is always smiling and having fun despite leading a very shitty life overall. Naruto has all reasons to be an angsty bastard like Sasuke. But what does he do? He says 'Angst? Wuzzat?', swallows the pain like a bitter pill and then makes the best of his situation. Or at least, so Hinata sees, your opinion may differ on this.

Kiba has the personality close enough to fit, but he does not have the circumstances or baggage that Naruto has. Kiba has a family that likes him. He is a member of a respected clan. He has an unfailingly loyal friend and partner in Akamaru. Kiba has everything that Naruto does not. Kiba has genuine reasons to be happy and few reasons to be sad and angsty. So he lacks that inner strength that Hinata likes about Naruto so much.

Changing gears, let's discuss another popular pairing with Hinata involved. SasuHina. Personally, I couldn't see Sasuke with anyone other than Naruto, but then again that's just things as I perceive them. Moving on, that pairing just wouldn't work using the canon circumstances and personalities. Satsuki does not like Hinata for the very same reasons that I believe Sasuke would not like Hinata. That was actually a statement against the SasuHina pairing. No, seriously.

However, there's a specific set of circumstances in which the pairing would work flawlessly without changing their personalities in the least. This is all based on comfort, even. Want to know something very funny? Naruto and Hinata's relationship... would not last very long. You see, Hinata comes from a very strict household in which if she fucks up she is instantly made aware of that fact and very rarely does she receive compliments. She is accustomed and used to such an environment and thus, despite appearances, she'd actually be comfortable in it.

Naruto, meanwhile, is the total opposite of that. He would be kind, caring and he would always forgive any and all failures, while praising any and all successes. The reason the relationship between those two wouldn't last long is that Hinata would feel as if she were walking on pins and needles. Naruto would just make her uncomfortable across time, she would just be more and more afraid of fucking up in such a way that he finally got angry at her.

Now, Sasuke would certainly hover around Naruto's circle of intimate friends. Even if I hate the idea of him getting back to Konoha scott-free, I can't say that it won't happen since the manga likes bending over and letting Sasuke have his way with it, most likely he'd be allowed to with Naruto's blessing. Hinata has had absolutely zero contact with Sasuke outside the academy in canon (and even then I doubt they'd interact), but they'd be forced to interact if he is Naruto's best friend. In Sasuke, Hinata would find a relationship she could take comfort in.

Because Sasuke would be cold, uncaring and unforgiving. He would tell Hinata straight up when she fucked up, and when he praised her, she would know that it's actually a big deal since unlike Naruto, his praises would be few and far between. So I believe that the SasuHina relationship could only work in the Netorare genre.

A genre which I absolutely despise since it turns good men into idiotic wimps who can't do shit for themselves and women into weak willed twats who are slaves to their vaginas.

Wow, that was one long-ass rant.

Now, you may all be asking why Hinata is a yandere in this story... Well, wouldn't you like to know that? Keep reading, and you just might find out.


	6. Mockingbird

Satsuki got home late. Very, very late indeed. So much so that she was certain she hadn't made it on the same day she'd taken her test. To her, it mattered little, wouldn't be the first time she slept relatively little due to her rather ridiculous training schedule. Even if, due to the exhaustion brought on from recent activities, she would feel horrible about it come morning.

She was surprised, very much so, when she climbed the apartment building's first flight of stairs and began to hear the unceasing pitter patter of small feet at a rapid and frantic rhythm. She knew very well who those feet belonged to because their owner was the only other occupant in the building. She raised an eyebrow when she climbed the second flight of stairs to find Naruto pacing back and forth relentlessly, lost to the world and biting her nails, yet not managing to cut them with her teeth.

"S-Satchan, is that you?"

Satsuki hadn't ever heard Naruto being quite like that before. In fact, she rarely saw Naruto being anything but an obliviously cheerful flirty airhead. It was an absolute shock to see her expressing such obvious worry and concern. "Naruto." Satsuki greeted.

The golden haired girl immediately lit up, her face stretching into a smile. "Satchan!" She cried happily, jumping at the Uchiha. Satsuki planted herself to the floor and braced herself for impact. It wouldn't do for her to let the blonde knock her down the stairs she'd just climbed. This resulted in Naruto nuzzling against her stomach. "I was so worried!"

"… Why?" asked the confusing Uchiha. She sincerely doubted that Naruto could even imagine the episode Satsuki had just had with Hinata. The Uchiha herself couldn't even believe it and she'd been there. She was also still slightly numb and scared, but mostly she was just really angry and filled with self loathing.

It seemed that Naruto noticed the dark turn her train of thought had taken and tightened her hold on her waist, rubbing her head against the entirety of the taller girl's torso before she finally settled against the place where Satsuki's breasts would someday be. "Ne, Satchan… I had a horrible nightmare…" Began the Uzumaki, smiling sheepishly. "I don't think I'll be able to sleep tonight…" She mumbled.

Satsuki grunted. "I don't care." She said, rolling her eyes. "Just go to bed." She said.

"Don't wanna." Naruto mumbled. "I wanna sleep with Satchan!" she declared, grabbing onto one of the Uchiha's arms and pulling her along. "Plus your bed's nicer than mine!"

Satsuki rolled her eyes again. "You just want to sleep on my bed." She said. Well, it WAS a good bed. It better be, considering it was worth a small fortune. Satsuki valued her sleep very much, considering how little of it she got, and she preferred to be as comfortable as possible when she slept. A remain from getting used to her mother's choice in mattress.

Naruto grinned and rubbed the back of her neck with her free hand, before turning around and continuing onto Satsuki's bedroom.

Resigning herself to her fate, Satsuki sighed. Entering a discussion with Naruto would just prolong the inevitable, she always got what she wanted in the end, and she was too exhausted. "I need to take a bath before I go to bed…" She said, trying to pull herself free from the blonde's grasp, but failing miserably.

Naruto had a surprisingly strong grip. And she was agile enough to pull Satsuki out of her stance of resistance with a quick pull of the arm. Naruto stilled her with a hand on her waist and then she invaded Satsuki's personal space, face first, before taking a deep sniff. "Satchan smells nice." She commented.

The Uchiha could only sigh in annoyance and surrender, deciding that she'd take a bath on the morning. Even if she was reluctant to dirty her sheets (she liked to go as long as possible between washes), today was special. Then again, most people would probably call her a cleanliness freak if they knew she bathed twice per day on most occasions. Again, the opposite, she didn't like cleaning anything, so she tried not to dirty things in the first place.

Before she could even protest, her shorts were on her ankles and her shirt was over her head. Naruto worked incredibly fast and was very good at undressing people before they could tell they'd been undressed. Satsuki shivered at the thought of knowing where she had picked up that skill from. A shiver that Naruto proceeded to misinterpret.

"Ah, Satchan must be cold! Quickly, get in the bed!"

Satsuki had zoned out while thinking of her morning routine, it seemed, because Naruto herself was only wearing what could only be described as a semi-transparent pink piece of cloth on her chest that Satsuki was certain hadn't been there when she had entered the apartment that barely concealed the blonde's developing chest and a set of matching pink panties.

Oddly enough, she felt that she was being more obscene with her simple black underwear. Then again, she was an Uchiha, it was practically in her blood to wear dark colors on every piece of clothing in her body. Shrugging and choosing to shut her brain off for the day. That is, until she was settled under the covers and noticed that Naruto's body was merely inches away.

The lack of light didn't help matters, as the moonlight that filtered from the window above the bed was more than enough to illuminate Naruto's mane of golden hair and give her usually tanned skin a much paler tone than was usual. Her usually vibrant eyes were bright as ever, easily visible despite the lack of light, as Naruto looked at her with a grin on her face. "Thank you, Satchan." She murmured.

"… No problem." She replied, blushing and looking away from the stupidly bright blue eyes that somehow made her feel warm and fuzzy inside. That girl had a serious talent to make people feel weird. A shiver ran down her spine at the possible reactions that people would have if they knew that she had let the class' dead last sleep with her in her bed. Heck, she already had enough with people fearing for her sexual orientation (very important in rebuilding a clan) because she hadn't liked any of the boys at the academy.

Once again, Naruto misinterpreted the shiver and, in a move that had Satsuki's face becoming scarlet in a millisecond, she pressed her body against the young Uchiha's own, trying to have as much skin to skin contact as possible. "Satchan's still cold!" She said.

Well, it was an effective way to kill any and all thoughts of cold. Indeed, the blonde was incredibly warm. "It's not that, you dumbass…" Replied the Uchiha, clearly disgruntled by the sudden move. Still, she only made a token resistance, product from exhaustion, both emotional and physical. "I swear that if anyone ever learns of this, I will kill you."

"Eh? Why?" Asked Naruto, clearly confused about why the thought of telling everyone she'd slept with Satsuki on the same bed would be something to be avoided. Satsuki found herself incredulous, but it brought back memories of her rather violent chat with the Hyuuga heiress, which had her scowling. This, in turn, caused Naruto to wince, thinking the aggression she leaked was meant for her instead. "Okay, I won't tell anyone…" She muttered in agreement.

"Good." Not being one to look a gift horse on the mouth, Satsuki let it go at that.

Minutes passed in absolute silence, well, almost absolute. It was broken by the sound of the girls breathing, what with being so close to each other and all. "You can't sleep either, can you?"

Satsuki found herself nodding before she could help herself.

"Well, that's not a problem…" Naruto muttered, as one of her hands came from Satsuki's waist (no longer applying force to stick the two of them closer, which the Uchiha girl was thankful for) and climbed up, tracing a line marking the place of the spine as it went, ultimately resting on her scalp for a few seconds before beginning to massage it earnestly.

Accompanying the soothing movements came a steady, low humming that had Satsuki thinking back on long gone and forgotten days, days that she couldn't even relive in her dreams. The humming grew in variety as Satsuki's arms finally removed themselves from her sides and snaked their way around the blonde girl's body against her will.

"N-Naruto, I…" Her voice was tight, she found a knot building in her throat. She desperately wanted to tell the blonde girl to stop, to quit that. She wanted to order her arms to push her away, her legs to kick her, her mouth to speak, but no command was carried through. Every muscle in her body tensed.

A burning sensation prickled at her eyes as she thought back on the day that had passed, and how it'd made her feel like she hadn't moved a step from where she'd been standing on the day her life had been burned to ashes. She thought back to the days where she still hadn't awakened to the harsh reality of the world, when she'd thought that those kinds of things only happened in stories told to children to keep them in line.

"Hush little baby, don't say a word… Mama's gonna buy you a mockingbird…"

A second hand began soothingly rubbing her back. A sob wracked the Uchiha girl's body.

"And if that mockingbird won't sing, mama's gonna buy you a diamond ring…"

Satsuki didn't know how long she'd spent on her perhaps only friend's embrace. Or how she'd ended up in her arms in the first place.

"And if that diamond ring turns brass, mama's gonna buy you a looking glass…."

She didn't care that she was under her bed sheets and that she was currently wearing her negligees and nothing else in front of a known pervert. She didn't bother thinking about anything at all at that point.

"And if that looking glass gets broke, mama's gonna buy you a billy goat…"

Another sob wracked the Uchiha's body and, perhaps for the first time in years, she allowed herself to cry openly, to forget about poise and appearances, about what's proper and what's not. She forgot about everything except the soothing voice, the comfortable warmth and the feeling of safety that they brought on.

"And if that billy goat won't pull, mama's gonna buy you a cart and bull…"

She closed her eyes and resigned herself to the presence that made the problems in the world go away, that made the feeling of misery go away with but a few words and a kind caress or two.

"And if that cart and bull turn over, mama's gonna buy you a dog named Rover…"

Little by little, the sobs that were tearing through her body began to calm.

"And if that dog named Rover won't bark, mama's gonna buy you a horse and cart…"

The words had begun to become distant, now, as the tension left her body and she finally relaxed, as the tears that still ran down her cheeks and stained her mattress began to stop flowing.

"And if that horse and cart fall down…"

As she finally succumbed to sleep, a small, contented smile painted itself on her face.

"You'll still be the sweetest baby in town."

Perhaps she would claim the act involuntary, but there was absolutely no doubt that she had immobilized the other person in her bed without mercy. Poor Naruto had found herself incapable of moving after Satsuki had decided to cling to her in her sleep.

Then again, if one were to go by the smile on the blonde's face, you'd be hard pressed to think she found this in any possible way a bad outcome. With slow and carefully calculated movements, the blonde eased herself into a more comfortable position, but not before rising slightly so that the Uchiha rested against her still flat chest.

Just before she herself succumbed to her own exhaustion, she placed an innocent kiss on the Uchiha's forehead. The black haired girl's lips curved slightly more in her sleep.

* * *

Why do I know the lyrics to a lullaby!? In english, at that!

It might or might not have to do with Enter Sandman. I'm blaming it on Metallica.

Some of you might be wondering just what happened with the length of this chapter, but the truth is, I just didn't feel right continuing the chapter after that point. Chapter five served the purpose I wanted it to serve, namely, intense mood whiplash. I wrote this story entirely for the purpose of yurishipping Team 7, but I have to say that it might have grown beyond that purpose already. It was originally just going to be fanservice for the sake of fanservice, then the idea for that intensely fucked up Hinata popped up in my head and I just had to do it. Similarly, many ideas popped up for use with Naruto, Satsuki and Sakura, though they won't manifest in full until they start getting more into a more involved plot than the setup that this has been.

To be perfectly and completely frank, I wasn't planning on making this more than a series of hyper-yurified versions of the canon events. Most of my plans for what would have happened have been discarded already, though you might see them as omakes in the future. Some that are very unlikely to make it are my original plans for the Wave Arc and the first time that Team 7 met with Gaara.

Originally, Haku would convince Zabuza to defect to Konoha because he'd become a member of Naruto's fan club (and yes, Haku would have been male on that plan, but right now, I could go either way) and Naruto would convince Gato to hand over his company by being, well, herself.

Similarly, Gaara would have developed a planet sized crush on Naruto after she was herself around him. For added hilarity... Shukaku would crush on her too. This results on Gaara promptly betraying the Sand/Sound alliance and derailing Orochimaru's plans spectacularly. When a pissed off Orochimaru summoned Manda to take revenge on the little girl that ruined his plans, Shukaku would prove how far it was willing to go for its crush by cooperating with Gaara to drop a giant sand castle on top of Manda.

One thing that remains the same is that when characterizing Naruto, I'm very heavily inspired by a certain H game. There will be references thrown to it all around the fic, or when I can, anyway. Most of them will be very easy to locate if you can identify them. A little hint I'll leave you is that the names of every daimyo and their families will most likely be taken from that game, as well as the names of several minor factions. The Land of Fire will probably be a dead give away for those who get the references, due to the name and characterization combo.

I'm perfectly willing to answer any and all questions sent my way. If you think that I didn't see your question, or if I genuinelly miss it, don't feel afraid to insist. I hate it when authors ignore my reviews, so I never ignore mine. Act upon others as you wish they'd act upon you, my mother used to say... I think... doesn't matter, it's still a workable saying...


	7. Crouching Kitty, Hidden Tiger Part 1

Today was the first day that Team 7 was a real team and not just a prospective one. It was, therefore, the first day that its members were real genin and not prospective genin. Today was a big step forward. Many young genin were in their brightest mood, enjoying the first day in which they'd be allowed to reap the benefits of their long academy education.

And nearly each and every single one of them had their bright mood crushed by their first taste of what genin actually did. But that's neither here nor there, for we do not care about the fate of all those poor little kids forced to pick up the trash in a freezing cold river, the ones that are forced to pick up the literal mountains of shit that gathered in the Inuzuka kennels or the frankly obscene amount of groceries that the richer members of Konoha's society often tasked the retrieval of upon genin.

No, the ones we care about currently found themselves walking through Konoha's main street, their objective being the Hokage's tower and within it the mission office, all three of them already on a bad mood. Or rather, Sakura was the only one who was showing her bad mood, while the other two female members of Team 7 found themselves both sporting different expressions. Satsuki had the ice cold mask in place while Naruto was clearly pleased with herself.

Kakashi was, once again, thanking all eight of the seven lucky gods for giving him his sensei's daughter on his team. He was almost completely certain that the girl would've made pretty much any team work, but this particular team had been perhaps the most well thought out one in the entire roster of recent graduates.

Some thought that Sarutobi might be starting to go senile with some of his decisions, but this proved that the old man was just as sharp as ever. Satsuki simply would not have worked on any other team. A general dislike of weak people would mean that she would've disliked anyone who was weaker than herself, and an inferiority complex born from living under her brother's shadow for the first eight years of her life meant that she'd resent anyone that was stronger even more.

Sakura herself had very shaky confidence and an obviously idealized image of the girl who'd practically been her idol during her academy years. It wasn't odd for a class to have a particularly popular member who everyone looked up to. Usually, however, kunoichi in training tended to be more focused on childish crushes and the pursuit of said crushes. Sakura had completely evaded the fate of her female classmates entirely on that one.

Kakashi didn't care who was the most popular boy in that graduating class, he'd known from the start of the year who exactly he'd get on his team and had never bothered to observe anyone else. He'd done the exact same thing with his prior teams and had always been rather correct in judging their worth.

Naruto was like glue. She made her team stick together simply by being there. She was the single best way there was to keep the flight risk that was Uchiha Satsuki firmly grounded to Konoha's soil. The girl most likely did not know it herself, but she was very much dependant on the blonde emotionally.

And physically, too, if the many, many times that the blonde had made breakfast, lunch and dinner for the Uchiha was anything to go by. Then again, Naruto often cooked for her ANBU guards, so maybe it wasn't so much dependency as it was the fact that Naruto loved to turn the products of her garden into food whenever she could.

Not that he complained, as he'd had many a great meal when he was supposed to watch over her. He just wished he could claim credit for teaching her to cook, but he didn't know who it'd been who'd actually taught her the art of cooking. Tenzo had taught her the basics of gardening, but she had quickly outstripped him, so nobody could be sure if it was just her being naturally good or someone teaching.

Kakashi wanted to see what their reactions would be to a D rank, so he decided to be an absolute dick about it and to pick the single worst D rank he could think of. Indeed, he was gonna give them the rudest awakening he could think of before he actually began training his team. After all, he had to know if their teamwork would hold up under a different kind of pressure than what he'd put them under during their genin test.

After what seemed like unending minutes, they finally got to the mission desk, where they saw the Hokage sitting behind the desk, looking for all the world as if he was having a field day. "Jiji!" Naruto yelled happily, running the rest of the distance between the desk and the door to the office. However, the Hokage raised his hand before she could jump over it. Had Kakashi made a guess, which he did, he would have guessed that she intended to jump over the desk and give the Hokage a hug.

She did that every time she saw him, after all.

"Naruto-chan, you're a ninja now, you can't do that anymore." Informed the super old man, smiling widely as she pouted at him. "Okay, just this once." He said, rolling his eyes as he saw the golden haired girl easily jumping over the desk and landing on his lap, her arms thrown around the elderly man's torso.

"… Did… Did Naruto just do what I think she did?" Sakura asked.

"You mean throw away every social convention we know is necessary when dealing with Hokage-sama?" Asked Satsuki in turn, her tone perfectly even and calm.

"Yes. I meant exactly that." Sakura replied, flatly.

"Oh, then she did just do that, yes." The Uchiha said, blinking. "… I think I should be more shocked than this, but it does not surprise me. It is Naruto, after all."

"Well, she is a bag of surprises alright…" The pinkette resigned herself to the fact that her teammate would never conform to the expectations of what a normal person would do.

"Hm, you didn't just come for a visit, did you Naruto?" Asked the Hokage, looking down to the girl who grinned from her seat on his lap before she untangled herself from him. He sighed, smiled and gestured for her to take her place formed along with her teammates and teacher, which he did with a flourish of movement that reminded him that he had to talk to her about the length of her skirt. Sometimes it was just indecent.

"We're here for a mission, Hokage-sama." Kakashi informed, blandly, clearly smirking from underneath his mask. Most chunin were apparently very used to Naruto randomly dropping in and hugging the Hokage, though he could see one or two newbies being clearly uncomfortable at the closeness that the Hokage displayed with the jinchuuriki.

Always hilarious, newbies were.

"Naruto, stop doing weird things!" Sakura chastised, glaring at the girl who merely stuck her tongue out and showed a face of clear cheekiness. It was interesting how much she could look unashamed of her own actions.

"… Pay attention." Satsuki commanded, silencing both her teammates.

"Well, leaving aside the sitcom antics, I want the Rescue mission." Kakashi informed. "It'll be good to see if they've got what it takes."

"This is just great, since the scroll is fresh." Sarutobi said, smiling widely and gesturing with his hand to the chunin to his left. The seventeen years old boy snickered and pulled a scroll from one of the drawers. The scroll was very clearly new, since neither the color of the paper had faded to yellow nor had the ink been run yet. Somehow, it emanated a feeling of dread that had all three girls of Team 7 looking at it weirdly.

They felt as if the thing would very soon become the bane of their existence. Even Satsuki seemed to display open apprehension at the presence of the scroll.

"Okay, Team 7, we've got a very important mission today, and I need to know if you three are ready to take on a mission that would have most genin teams balk." Kakashi said, his tone completely serious and grim. "I need you to know before we take this mission that it's very possible that either one or all of you may suffer massive injuries. Are you willing to take it regardless?"

"Of course, sensei!" Naruto replied almost without thinking. She wasn't one to back down, ever. Satsuki nodded, as well. Sakura found herself unable to say no, not if both of her teammates had already agreed.

She did seem completely insecure at the thought of engaging in a potentially dangerous mission right up from the start of her ninja career, and who could blame her? After all, Kakashi had put it very simply, taking on such a mission was likely to end up with all three of them injured.

If she just knew…

"Okay, then, Team 7 might just be the first team to ever willingly take on this mission." Sarutobi stated, smiling widely, though it seemed oddly… eerie. As if he was trying to smile in another way that made shivers run down the genin's spines. "Okay, then, Team 7, your mission is to rescue Tora."

"Tora?" Asked a rather curious and surprised Team 7 in unison. "Who is Tora?" They asked.

"Tora is a very important individual in the hierarchy of the Land of Fire. Indeed, she is very, very close to the wife of our Daimyo, Kichou-sama." Explained Kakashi.

"Yeah." The chunin sitting to the left of the Hokage said, nodding with a grim expression. "Her disappearance always causes a commotion, but she also is prone to them."

"Who IS Tora?" Asked Sakura, clearly exasperated.

"Tora is… Kichou-sama's pet cat." Sarutobi Hiruzen stated, his face breaking into a smile.

"You cannot be serious." Satsuki stated, as both of her teammates were simply too shocked to offer an actual comment on the ridiculous bit of information that they'd just received.

"Our first mission as ninja is to… Look for a cat!? What kind of ninja mission is this?!" Naruto asked, clearly thoroughly shocked at the idea that they were degraded to performing such ridiculous and simple tasks instead of doing something interesting, like saving a princess, a Daimyo or something like that.

"A very important one. Kichou-sama does love her cat, and she pays handsomely for her retrieval." Kakashi said, blandly.

"Okay, fine, let's just get this over with." Sakura said, her palm meeting her face. "After all, it's just hunting a cat, how hard could it possibly be?"

In hindsight, perhaps she should have realized just how deep the shit they'd just jumped into was when everyone else in the room burst out laughing except her teammates.

* * *

Deep in the forests of one of Konoha's training grounds, there lied face first in the ground against the soft grass three girls. All three of them were covered in bruises, scratches, cuts and all forms of grime, dirt and overall forest junk. Even their clothes had not escaped unscathed, suffering from having come into contact with claws sharper than they had any right to be.

"We can't chase Tora like this." Sakura muttered, as she picked herself off the ground, removing a few twigs that had gotten caught in her hair as she did, as well as straightening out the strands that had found themselves liberated from her headband and thus began to fall on her face. "It's just too smart and too agile for us. Too small, too."

"Yeah… it can go into all sorts of tiny places we can't follow it through." Naruto said, also raising her face from the grass before letting it fall down again. The grass was soft enough that she just wanted to lie down and rest for a while.

They'd been chasing Tora for the better part of an hour, running nonstop through the forest and even going the full mile and chasing it through the denser parts, where the underbrush became too thick to thread quickly.

Satsuki groaned as she moved so she was leaning against a nearby tree. The underbrush was not particularly comfortable, so she had decided to strip it away first, carelessly ripping the plants off the ground and instead laying on the soft, humid dirt left behind and resting her back against the tree. The bark was a bit too hard to be comfortable, but it was still something like a chair.

Sakura groaned, sitting up fully and trying to figure out a way to beat this mission that had them so vexed. She cursed herself for ever underestimating the difficulty of this mission and for ever accepting it in the first place, though it was obvious they wouldn't have had a choice either way. Then she remembered a very important detail. Naruto…

Yeah. The blonde had come up with a plan that had gotten all three of them passed through Kakashi's bell test, and she WAS the girl who could routinely outwit chunin at the academy, when she performed her oft hilarious pranks. An idea crept into Sakura's brain.

"Hey, Naruto… You're our idea girl here. Any brilliant ideas for this?" Asked the pinkette, ignoring the odd gaze that her other teammate gave her as Naruto seemed to fall into a pensive pout. How she could tell despite the fact that Naruto was face down against the grass, well, that's for you to guess. "Nothing?" That would be a damn shame.

"Wait! I think I've got an idea!" Goldiloc- er, I mean Naruto, began, nodding to herself, her voice muffled by the grass. "I can use henge to make myself some sort of small animal-"

"Naruto, Henge doesn't work like that." Sakura immediately countered. "You can't transform into something smaller than yourself."

"… Why?" Naruto asked, clearly confused by the notion.

"Henge works by creating a chakra layer above yourself that looks like what you transformed into. You don't really transform. How can you not know this?" Sakura asked, raising an eyebrow and being herself confused at the ignorance of the golden haired girl. How could she not know this when she had invented a variant of it that had ensured a particular outcome of the jutsu (IE, a sexy girl)?

"… Really? I always thought it was real transformation. I… was kinda skipping class the day the Henge was explained." She admitted, rising to a seated position and rubbing the back of her neck. "I just kinda messed with handsigns until I got a combination that worked." She admitted, shrugging.

"… That is both the dumbest and most ridiculous thing I've ever heard." Sakura stated, completely and utterly baffled.

"… I wish I could say the same." Satsuki muttered. "But I've heard her say and do dumber things. I suggest you just roll with it." The Uchiha advised.

"Fine." Sakura said, rolling her eyes. "We'll roll with it. We'll have time to talk about how you managed to screw the Henge to the point of creating your own jutsu later." She added, taking a deep breath. "So… you were saying?"

"Um… I forgot?" Naruto said, blushing and smiling sheepishly.

"I want to punch you so bad right now…" Sakura mumbled. "Be glad my arms don't want to move or I would END you."

The golden haired girl giggled. "Kidding, kidding." She said, raising her hands on the typical surrendering motion. "Anyhow, it's really simple. Trying to clear out the foliage around here… foliage is the correct word, right?" She asked, seeing both of her teammates nod. She gave a grateful nod of her own. "Anyway, it'd take forever to clear the way, so it'd just be easier if I transform into a small animal and then chase it out of its hiding place. Then you guys catch it when its coming out."

"… How do we deal with its claws?" Satsuki asked, pointing to her own whisker marks, courtesy of Tora.

Naruto began to tap her pointer finger against her lower lip for a few seconds before making the sound of a light bulb suddenly turning on and snapping her fingers. Then, with a swift motion, she revealed that she was, indeed, wearing something below her jacket by unzipping and removing it. It was only a white training bra, though.

"Naruto, wear a goddamn shirt." Sakura said, her eyebrow twitching.

"But I love the feeling of my jacket on my skin! And Satchan already got all up on my face about this thing!" She said, tugging at the brassiere on her chest and not even trying to hide how uncomfortable she was wearing the thing. "Anyway, you can use my jacket to tie it up. It's very resistant to cuts!"

Indeed, the piece of cloth was still completely unharmed despite Tora's best efforts.

Satsuki sighed. Then she looked down on her blue shirt. It was very clearly abused from the cat's frantic attacks, but it would still fully cover the smaller girl's torso. When she began to pull it off, however, she realized that in her haste (certain events had caused her to oversleep that morning, something she blamed Naruto for) to get going, she had forgotten to wear her undershirt… and was now showing her underwear to her two teammates.

She yelped and hastily pulled the shirt down, blushing up a storm. "I did not just do that." She said.

Sakura nodded, dumbly, blushed scarlet herself and looked not unlike someone had just given her a bar of candy. For some reason, Satsuki wanted to pinch her cheeks and pull them. Or eat her. That's how much she looked like a tomato.

Naruto, a faint tint of pink in her cheeks, merely whistled. "Satchan's are bigger than mine." She remarked.

Satsuki did not dignify that with an answer. "Just… just get to it, Naruto. We'll figure out how to get you to Konoha decently later."

Neither decided to mention Sakura's reluctance to remove the uppermost layer of clothing she wore, that red battle dress. Neither knew if she was wearing anything under it to lend to Naruto, so it would've been pointless to call her out on being unwilling to help her teammate.

Naruto's hands slowly went through a series of handsigns, or at least slowly compared to her teammates' speeds and she cried out "Henge" before disappearing in a poof of smoke, revealing, in her place, a small, furry and very, very orange creature.

"… A fox. Really?" Sakura asked, raising an eyebrow. She literally couldn't have chosen a worse animal in Konoha. Then again, there were lots of foxes in Konoha's outskirts, which some theorized was because of the presence of the Nine Tailed Fox not all that long ago. Even so, they kept to the outskirts because it was no secret that the civilians made it a sport to hunt them.

The ninja were oft too busy to join in, even if they wanted to.

It literally took a whole second for Sakura to notice that Naruto was no longer resting against the grass where she'd transformed. Sakura blinked and saw that Satsuki had moved at an incredible speed. Now, the Uchiha held Naruto, who kicked all her paws futilely, off the ground, looking at the small kit of a fox critically.

The Uchiha clan had been the one to most vehemently hate the Kyuubi no Kitsune, though Sakura didn't really know why. They had also been the sponsors of quite a few fox hunts back in the day. It was absolutely no shock that Satsuki herself would hate foxes, as pretty much everyone in her family did, for some reason.

After a few seconds, the Uchiha just put Naruto on the ground and sighed. "Just… just go." She said, shaking her head.

Naruto did not need to be told twice as she darted into the underbrush, perhaps too comfortable on all fours for this to stop being weird for Sakura. "Maybe it was a worse idea than I thought…" the pinkette stated, rubbing her chin and frowning. It'd take a while, as the foliage was so thick that it was possible Naruto couldn't see shit in there.

She turned to look at the Uchiha, who was sitting on the grass and looking at the opening in the brush that Naruto had jumped into. "So cute…" She mumbled to herself.

Sakura simply let her face meet her palm and groaned. She wished she could say Satsuki was falling from the pedestal she'd set her in but… She had to admit, Naruto's transformation had resulted in an obscenely adorable fox kit. Maybe she just needed to relax. It was obvious that Satsuki was relaxed and in higher spirits than usual.

At least, that's what the smile on the Uchiha's face told her.

She… was not entirely certain that losing the image of the impossibly cool, unflappable Satsuki was a bad thing if it meant seeing her smile more often. She had a very pretty smile, Sakura realized with a blush.

Lost in thought, both members of Team 7 resigned themselves to waiting until Naruto completed her part in the plan and herded the cat in their direction.

* * *

Now back to Fanservice for the sake of fanservice!

Here is the first hint as to the identity of the daimyo of the land of fire. He's usually depicted as a heartless villain and he was famous for his cruelty, however, this particular depiction of him is that of a very nice, if a bit eccentric, lord. Whoever is the first to correctly guess his identity will win... something. Okay, I got it. I'll write an omake with whatever you wish on it if you can correctly guess the name of the Land Of Fire's Daimyo before I reveal it in-story. He and his entire family will be present at the end of this mini arc, and so far, it's looking like it'll be a three parter so you'll have at the most a week before I conclude it. Or it could be as little as two days. Depends on how I feel, really.

Anyway, point is, you could get me to write what you want me to write if you can correctly guess who this guy is. Ain't that nice of me to reward y'all?

If any of you wants my opinion on 631, released the same day as this chapter... or one day before it at any rate... it was hilarious.


	8. Crouching Kitty, Hidden Tiger Part 2

Sakura groaned when she heard a very, very angry yip as well as an undeniably frightened feline shriek. Their short rest was pretty much over already, and she had barely regained her breath or soothed the pain coming from the scratches the feline of doom had made upon them. The sound of two little animals disturbing the brush was heard and suddenly, a brownish blur passed right between Sakura's legs.

Her reaction time had been entirely too slow to catch Tora, and by the time she'd crossed her legs, threw herself to the ground and made a motion to catch whatever was right in front of her, she was already too late. Instead of catching a mad cat, she caught an angry fox…

… She grossly underestimated the sheer force that the tiny, furry bullet would carry, though, and Sakura found herself quickly bowled over by the small animal. She hadn't been standing in the proper way to absorb the force behind the unintentional tackle. The world turned upside down and she found herself groaning about the pain that her head meeting the ground caused.

Thankfully, the blow hadn't been strong enough to give her a concussion, but it still hurt like a bitch. And there was now a fox that was far too light, she mused, considering it was in truth a transformed human. The laws and rules that governed the Henge had, evidently, bent over and let Naruto rape them, as she ignored each and every precept that Sakura had been taught about the technique.

She didn't have time to muse over this, however. The fox in her chest looked at her in the only way a fox could, making her look quizzical as she tilted her head to the side, clearly surprised at being blocked from her prey by Sakura. She then leaned forward and gave a few licks to the pinkette's cheek, causing her cheeks to try their hardest to match her hair.

That was pretty much all the confirmation they needed for it to obviously be Naruto. If a fox could smile, she clearly would've been smiling. A poof of smoke changed the situation so that instead of a fox sitting on its haunches on top of Sakura, it was the blonde straddling Sakura's hips. "Your chest is comfortable, Sakura-chan. We should do this more often." She remarked, making no move to get off.

With a few swift and quick movements, Sakura did what any reasonable individual would and threw Naruto off her. She also made a point to ignore Naruto's pout about it, because that way lay madness.

She turned to their failsafe, namely, Satsuki. The one who would trap the cat in Naruto's jacket, tie it up and deliver it to the Daimyo's wife… to find her sitting on the ground blinking and clearly confused. "What just happened?" Asked the Uchiha, blinking and looking at the nearly shredded jacket she held on her hands.

"… That was my favorite jacket…" Naruto said, pouting and crossing her arms as she stood up, clearly feeling the cold of the breeze on her now furless chest. "… Gimme." She said, to which the Uchiha complied.

Sakura narrowed her eyes at the sight. "That cat's stronger than we thought…" She mused, noticing that it had pretty much made Naruto's jacket absolutely fail to cover her mid riff.

The zipper was a loss, too, so she was forced to tie it together lest Naruto's modesty go unprotected. Lord knows she wouldn't care, but Sakura did. Plus, Satsuki was very clearly distracted and Sakura was against anything that made the most competent of their team distracted in a mission that would require all of their effort and abilities.

"I've got a new respect for cats." Naruto muttered, looking at how her shirt had ended up. "This thing is really, really tough. I've had it since forever without a scratch." She added, smiling. "Luckily, I have others." She said, shrugging.

"Should we stop to pick up new clothes?" Sakura noted, looking at her pretty much ruined outfit.

"No way! They'll just get ruined too." Naruto replied, shaking her head. "Plus, I think the wild, disheveled style looks good on both of you."

"Naruto, you think everything looks good on us." Satsuki remarked, dryly.

"Well, it's not my fault if you can make anything look good." Naruto replied, smiling widely at the blush on both of her teammates' faces. "Anyway, I've got its scent locked this time! It won't escape from me!" Naruto yelled, standing up and breaking off into a run.

"Where does she get her energy from?" Sakura asked, gasping as she saw Naruto continue to run as if she hadn't been doing so for a very long time now. She herself was pretty close to exhaustion despite having had a rest not too long ago, and while Satsuki was faring better, she was also not up to a full sprint like the Uzumaki was.

Satsuki merely looked at Sakura for a second before turning away and beginning to jog behind Naruto. Luckily, the Uzumaki wasn't very fast on her feet despite her bountiful energy, so they'd be able to have a reasonably easy time following her. She was also neglecting any and all thoughts of covering her tracks…

… Which was probably the smart thing to do, given she wanted her teammates to track her.

Sakura groaned as she joined the Uchiha's jog. Her every muscle was burning. She'd have to run laps more often if this was what was expected from genin.

* * *

Naruto's trail of destruction lead deeper into the forest. Apparently, she'd at some point caught up to the cat and engaged it in combat once again. This was obvious from the claw marks left on just about every tree. There were several fist marks along the grassy floor of the forest, followed by claw marks from where the cat had scrambled to safety.

The claw marks multiplied while the fist marks disappeared completely a few meters away from where the confrontation had started, so the two other girls of Team 7 surmised that Naruto was put on the defensive and they spent longer fighting in one spot before moving on from there. Either that or Naruto was getting better at dodging the cat's wild swipes. Maybe she was using the trees as cover?

Either that or the cat had found a way to fuck gravity and run along trees. Actually, scratch that.

A quick look up revealed a myriad broken branches above them, which supported the idea that at some point the fight had been taken to the air, using the trees as platforms to jump into an ever increasing conflict.

The tracks became even easier to follow upon that discovery, as while spread out, they were all headed in the same direction, the one in which the cat and Naruto had been advancing.

They were rewarded for following Naruto's tracks by coming upon a clearing that bore the signs of a devastating battle and, judging from the humidity of the upturned earth, the freshness of the leaves on the floor and the presence of the damn cat, it was pretty clear that the fight had been very recent.

And they also discovered why there were no more fist marks. Apparently, at some point Naruto had thought it convenient to turn into a small animal to more properly fight and chase Tora. She knew enough about animals to know that canines don't seem to like felines. However, it seemed that she still had a predilection towards foxes.

This gave the very weird image of a tiny, incredibly adorable fox squaring off, Samurai-movie style, against a rather fat and violent cat. Were they holding swords, this could actually be turned into an animal based comedy.

Well, except for the fact that there was a very clearly open wound in Naruto's forehead that was gushing blood. The fox curled her mouth into a snarl that did not manage to be threatening and let out a low yip that might have been an attempt at a growl, while the cat meowed in response.

The situation was way too surreal for either Sakura or Satsuki to interrupt, and they were not entirely shocked to find themselves wanting popcorn to enjoy the scene that could only have come from an epically stupid yet stupidly epic Saturday morning cartoon. "… Twenty Ryo on the cat." Satsuki muttered.

"You're on." Sakura replied, crossing her arms and watching as the two deathly rivals glared at each other, readying for the final clash.

And clash they did. Both ran at each other, full speed, and engaged in a fast paced and frenetic frenzy of melee. The cat's impressively sharp claws were very clearly capable of slicing through the fox's hide, as it proved when it tagged the fox on the side. Similarly, the fox found that its tail was both much stronger and mobile than the cat's, allowing it to use it as a blunt weapon.

The cat's fur might have prevented the bruises from showing, but as the melee prolonged, it began to lose steam. Its bulk was already preventing it from moving at the same speed that the smaller and sleeker fox enjoyed, which meant that its more powerful claws were incapable of dealing more than glancing cuts.

"You know, the henge should have dispelled the moment the cat touched her." Sakura informed Satsuki. "But at this point, I'm not even surprised, really."

"Welcome to my world." Satsuki muttered in response.

The two mighty opponents found their bodies crashing together, though this proved to be a bad move on Naruto's part. The cat's impressive bulk took Naruto's weight without even flinching, and its position allowed it to deal quite a few punishing swipes at the poor fox's head, leaving numerous cuts all along its upper back and most of its front.

The tips of its fluffy ears, once a beautiful white, was now stained with its own blood.

"Why are we watching this?" Sakura asked.

"I don't know." Satsuki replied. "… But I can't stop."

"Neither can I." Sakura admitted. "But isn't this animal cruelty?" asked the pinkette.

Satsuki didn't even bother answering, as she was too concentrated on the melee that had just been broken.

Indeed, Naruto found herself dazed by Tora's ruthless assault and needed to put some distance between them. The cat, being tired and weary, did not follow, instead choosing to offer her a feline glare from its spot. It arched its back and meowed in a threatening fashion, rising its paw and swiping at the air, its blood stained claws very visible, painted the same color as the ribbon on its left ear.

"The next clash will be the last." Satsuki said, nodding to herself.

"You think?" Sakura asked, tilting her head.

"Yes. Neither will be able to continue much longer. Tora is nearly exhausted from the long chase and this fight, and Naruto is too wounded to continue this fight for much longer. I wouldn't be surprised if she found it hard to stay conscious." After all, the cat had struck her on the head many times, and Tora was surprisingly strong for what looked like a fat house cat. "So they will finish it in the next clash."

"… I think you're giving them too much credit." Sakura stated, deadpan.

Satsuki blinked. "You're probably right." She admitted.

The fox yipped and the cat hissed. The fox blurred as it stepped forward, and Tora jumped forward, its own paws blurring at the point the two animals met.

"It's over." Satsuki said, causing Sakura to blink.

Both stood, their backs to each other, on all fours. Their tails were swaying freely to and fro. There was the sound not unlike a branch being split in half, and Tora fell on its side. A poof and a cloud of smoke heralded Naruto turning back into human form, showing her every wound to the world. Her jacket had come undone during the chase and thus exposed her chest, which was, much like the rest of her body, covered in scratch marks.

The blonde fell to her knees, keeping herself from hitting the ground face first with her left arm while using the right arm to try and stem the blood flow from the sizable cut on her forehead. "… I don't feel too well…" She mumbled, as she tried her hardest to remain awake. Then she turned. "Hn… Satchan, Sakura-chan, you two caught up! That's nice!" She said, grinning at her teammates. "I got the cat!"

The wide grin coupled with her squinted eyes and the whisker marks made her look far too much like the fox she'd just transformed into to battle Tora. Both of the other two kunoichi shook their heads, still in mild disbelief over how their first mission had ended up going.

"I'll take a nap now." The blonde said, crashing face first to the ground.

"… I'll take the cat if you take Naruto." The pinkette said, looking at the Uchiha, who merely looked at her as if trying to say 'You traitor!', yet failing miserably to make Sakura think of anything other than the fact that Naruto got very grabby when she was asleep and Sakura had claimed dibs on the cat to avoid that.

"… I'll buy you dinner." Satsuki said, looking at Sakura entirely seriously.

That WAS incredibly tempting. In fact, Sakura blushed as her brain supplied the image of her and Satsuki in a classy restaurant, sharing a charming evening together. She slapped her cheeks. "Okay. Just this once."

Satsuki nodded, somehow managing to look as dignified as ever as she went to the cat and slung it over her shoulder like a sack of potatoes. It was heavier than she expected it to be, but still more bearable than carrying Naruto would be. At least the cat was completely out of it.

Sakura was blushing up a storm as she adjusted Naruto on her back, giving the unconscious girl a piggyback ride. Because Naruto was already making herself comfortable, making her doubt the blonde really being asleep. If it weren't for the too-regular breathing cycle or the occasional soft snore, she'd smack her for nuzzling against her neck.

"Let's just get this over with…" Sakura muttered, already beyond caring.

* * *

The sound of something gigantic thumping against a stone wall broke Naruto off her reverie as she simply floated in the surprisingly warm water that was all around her. She couldn't see anything, there was only blackness as far as her eyes could see. Oddly enough, she could see her body perfectly fine, despite the absolute lack of light.

The water was then simply gone, as if it'd never been there, or rather, it had parted in front of her, gently lowering her until she touched something solid and completely dry. When she looked down, she only saw further blackness, nothing supporting her weight. With a yawn, she began to walk on the path that the parted water had opened.

Why, one might ask?

She would have given a very simple answer. "I am Uzumaki Naruto, I don't need reasons!" and then continued on her way. Truth is, there really was nothing else to do and she was too sleepy to sit down and think about her situation. Plus, the repeating sound of something thumping against stone came from that way and she was curious.

At some point, she saw some really funky giant columns. Beyond them, the water walls disappeared completely, though there was nothing there that would tell her how the water was stopped there. Failing to give a crap, she continued, walking right past the metallic rods that stopped the water without any problems whatsoever.

The sound was so strong now that she could swear it was pretty much the only thing keeping her awake. Half lidded eyes scanned her surroundings, though there was only one thing visible beyond the huge metal columns. It was something fluffy, and it was huge. It was also smacking against the wall.

"Fucking container-*thump*- losing against-*thump*- a fucking cat -*thump*- such a disgrace -*thump*."

She giggled at the sight of what looked not unlike a gigantic ball of fur smacking its head against the wall. She walked towards it, beginning to see the gigantic squared stones that made up the walls as well as the complete form of the ball of fur. She couldn't accurately distinguish what exactly it was, she could only say that it was very big and that it was very fluffy.

It also looked very, very comfortable. "Hm… yeah… it'll do…" she mumbled to herself before jumping face first on the long furry thing right in front of her, sinking into the long and soft hairs. She moaned in happiness at the nice feeling.

"You… what are you doing?" a booming voice interrupted her sleep.

"I'm sleepy. This is comfortable. So I'm sleeping." She said, as if it was the most logical thing in the world. Which to her, it was, as she didn't give a flying shit about anything else at the time.

"… No. No way. You're not sleeping on my tail, brat!" the same booming voice continued.

"But it's so fluffy!" She groaned in discontent, nuzzling against it. She pouted and looked up. She was met with one ginormous red eye that looked at her from up above.

"Of course it's fluffy. It's one of my tails. Their fur is the softest and most comfortable in the world." There was obvious pride in the voice of the fluffy thing, so Naruto smiled widely. "… I won't allow anyone to touch them without my permission!"

The voice came from far away enough that despite its booming quality, it was yet to shatter her eardrums, but since the creature seemed to draw its head closer, it was starting to hurt Naruto's ears to hear it. "Don't care." She mumbled. "Sleepy now. Gonna sleep."

"… You can't do this." The thing continued.

"Watch me." She replied, grinning as she let go of consciousness and became completely unresponsive to the world.

"You do realize I can just throw you off, right?" The creature asked, though it was surprised when the only response it got was a slight movement of the flea-sized invader in its fur. Naruto was very clearly beyond its voice's reach. "… Dammit…"

Naruto's mouth curled into a smile.

* * *

Sakura blinked as Naruto relaxed fully, something ninja were rarely able to do even in their sleep. The golden haired girl also sighed happily, and a look over her shoulder showed Sakura the content smile on her face. "She must be having a nice dream." The pinkette mused. She tore her eyes away from the blonde's face, because there could possibly be no way that it was hard to look away from it, no sir, and she didn't have the temptation to just look at her face for a while. Because she was not adorable in any way, shape or form and Sakura was certain of it.

No matter what her cheeks might show otherwise!

Satsuki said nothing as they finally broke out of the forest. Sakura could have sworn that for a moment, the usually stoic Uchiha girl had turned to her and smiled. Once again, Sakura found herself blushing and noticing that the Uchiha had a very pretty smile.

* * *

The winner of the mini-contest was a guest reviewer by the name of Randomdude! However, due to the fact that he was a guest reviewer, I have absolutely no way to contact him. Therefore, I can't ask what he would have wanted me to write an omake about. I can't possibly guess, either. The second person to guess was, similarly, a guest reviewer, so I must go to the third winner. Congratulations, csad21. I hope the scene you asked for is to your liking.

Next chapter, the conclusion of this mini-arc, folks.

If any of you guys wants another mini-contest to have an omake/scene (depending on whether or not I can work it into the plot) based on a premise of yours, I'll have one ready for the next update. It will likely be the same sort of random trivia. Could be something ridiculously easy, like guessing the name of the capital of the Land of Fire, or something that I have given absolutely no hints to, but is still something that I find oddly appropriate for canon, like the name of the Daimyo of the Land of Wind. Actually...

Guess the name of the Daimyo of the Land of Wind and you will get me to write something you want me to! I know it's not redeemable for money, but I'm broke, so... yeah.


	9. Crouching Kitty, Hidden Tiger End

"… It seems you had… an interesting afternoon." The Hokage stated, raising one eyebrow as he looked at the rather… poor state that Team 7 had wandered into his office in. Luckily, he made it a point to receive this mission's result and report directly in his office. Being a very high profile mission, it was more of a necessity than a pleasure most of the time.

"Understatement of the century." Sakura deadpanned, too tired, annoyed and angry to pay proper respect to the Hokage at the moment. Mentally, she slapped herself for this transgression, but ultimately, she couldn't bring herself to apologize for the outburst. She did not know whether she wanted to die or she wanted to kill everyone.

That mission? Totally not worth the time spent doing it. The pay was laughable, considering the amount of effort they'd had to put into it. Heck, they could take several D ranks during that time. Sure, most D ranks paid significantly less than the Tora mission, or so Kakashi had informed them at some point, but the quantity would more than make up for the difference. And they wouldn't be as frustrated or annoyed afterwards.

"Where is sensei? He must die." Satsuki stated, her tone entirely serious and the venomous anger laced within it making it so her predicament didn't lessen the impact of her seriousness. Clearly, she was not one to be fucked with, and even covered in scratches and little bits of the forest she'd brought with herself, she was still Konoha's Ice Princess.

"… you know, I'm beginning to wonder when a genin team will get the idea to use catnip." Asked a new voice, sounding entirely too amused. The voice was feminine and smooth like velvet, pleasant to the ear yet with an undercurrent of power and authority that left no doubt about the strength of the woman carrying it. "Tora's a sucker for that stuff."

"Ah, Kichou-sama." Said Sarutobi, smiling widely. "I trust you came to pick up Tora?"

At that moment, Sakura and Satsuki were frozen on the spot. Suddenly, both of them felt amazingly idiotic. This was entirely to be expected from someone like Naruto, who was an idiot and widely recognized as such. Heck, she was proud of being as much of an idiot as she was, and she flaunted her idiocy everywhere she went.

She also flaunted other things… things she didn't quite have yet.

"Of course I am, Sarutobi-san." From behind Team 7 stepped in a strikingly beautiful woman. The woman was wearing a simple green kimono, nothing too fancy. No ridiculous decorations. In fact, she looked positively austere. However, that only helped her overall appearance, as she had nothing that detracted from her natural beauty. She had short hair in a rather boyish cut, the face that could send a thousand ships and the deceptively thin and lithe arms of a kunoichi.

Satsuki had a trained eye, brought on from being raised in a clan that placed great emphasis in the power of the eyes. Therefore, she had trained herself to make her Sharingan's strengths stronger, by increasing her attention to detail as much as she could without crippling her ability to see the wider picture. And she could tell, at a glance, that this woman was a kunoichi.

A damn good one. Her posture was that of a woman of noble birth, her arms hid the strong muscle with a layer of soft appearing skin, carefully applied makeup hid the hundreds of tiny scars that came from the harsh life of a shinobi and her eyes were relaxed and calm.

She was good enough that Satsuki only realized she was a kunoichi because she hadn't made a sound as she walked up to them. Not a single sound. Not the rustle of cloth of her kimono, not her footsteps, nothing at all. Even her breathing made close to no sound whatsoever. The only reason she'd allowed herself to act like this was probably because she was relaxed and not actively trying to fit the mold of a noble.

A kunoichi who had her abilities so deeply engrained into her that she executed them automatically.

The woman seemed vaguely amused by Satsuki's scrutiny, but the Uchiha quickly schooled her features before any more of her shock and awe could be perceived past the mask of ice. Fiery determination flared within her, engraving in her soul a burning desire to reach the level of ability that this woman oh so casually displayed and blaze right past it.

"Tora must have gotten plenty of exercise already. He seems almost fully exhausted." The lady Kichou spoke, her voice melodious and enchanting. Even that, was the act of a very experienced kunoichi. She automatically changed the pitch and tone of her voice so that it sounded endearing to her audience.

She wasn't a good kunoichi, she was a bloody genius of a kunoichi.

Fitting, Satsuki guessed, for the last line of defense for the Daimyo. "Ah, yes, I observed this mission through the use of my crystal ball. A most… interesting run, I must say." Sarutobi spoke, grinning slightly. "Since Kakashi was not involved with this mission, I think we can safely guess that he forfeited his part of the reward for its completion."

"Ah, yes, I quite agree with your assessment, Hokage-sama." Kichou spoke, smiling widely.

The politicking of the high class wasn't something foreign to either of the awake members of team 7, but they still thought it rather unnecessary. The thought of getting the portion of the reward that would go to Kakashi, however, warmed their hearts a little. At least they were compensated somewhat for having a shitty jounin teacher who couldn't get off his ass to help them catch a goddamn cat.

It didn't make Sakura want to murder the Daimyo's wife any less, for putting them through that nightmare of a mission just so her cat could get some exercise.

Without a word, Satsuki just handed Tora to the brown haired woman, who smiled warmly and patted the Uchiha's head. This did not amuse Satsuki in the least. "Don't worry, we'll be supporting you on the task you set for yourself." Spoke the Daimyo's wife, making Satsuki frown.

Sakura smiled, however, and opened her mouth to be the polite one who would thank the Daimyo in Satsuki's behalf, when the blonde on her back stirred, slowly coming back to the land of the awake.

As she roused herself to awareness, Naruto made a series of unintelligible sounds that sounded like words, but weren't. And were they to be frank, neither of her teammates truly wanted to know what it was that she was mumbling about. Something about impossibly fluffy, warm beds and her not wanting to wake up.

It took her more than a few minutes, but eventually, Sakura could put the weight behind her back down. Naruto rubbed at her eyes, trying to get the rest of the sleep out of them. "Did we win?" She asked, looking around. "… Why are we in my future office?" she added.

"Your future office?" Asked the daimyo's wife, raising an eyebrow. "That's quite a big claim, young miss."

"Of course I do, pretty lady! I'll be the Hokage before you can even see me coming!" Said Naruto, smiling with palpable contentment. It seemed she'd had a quite nice dream, and it had her quite relaxed after resting. "Just you wait!"

"Oh ho, that's quite a lot of motivation." A new, rather laid back and cheerful voice broke through the reverie brought on by Naruto's boast. "You can always aim a bit lower, you know?"

"No way, mister! That would be like giving up! And I never give up!" Spoke Naruto, turning around and meeting the man who had spoken. The man was dressed in a simple hakama, nothing too expensive. A few scars decorated his exposed skin, violet eyes settled into an easy and lazy gaze that swept through the room and made no secret of the way they did so.

Sakura smacked the back of Naruto's head. "Be a little more respectful, idiot!" She spoke, her tone hushed. "Can't you tell who this man is?"

"Nope. Should I know?" The blonde asked, tilting her head and frowning cutely.

"I can't believe you!" Sakura groaned, frustration pretty much taking form in her face, a mask of suffering like no brainy guy had ever felt upon being forced to deal with an idiot for a lengthy period of time. "How did you even pass the academy!?"

He was a bit pale and the elbow length sleeves failed to hide the thinness of his arms, but he moved with a certain air of… control, would be the best word to put it, that showed that despite his appearance, he was not a weak man who would be like a leaf shaking in the wind. Satsuki's analyzing eye once again far outstripped her teammates', and without a doubt, she could call this man a warrior.

Not a shinobi. He didn't have the sleek, athletic body type that shinobi cultivated. Nor did he have the choice of unrestrictive attire that even the Lady Kichou had stuck to despite being a noble. There was just an air of power and authority about the man who had just wandered into the room that told her that this man was a skilled fighter and not one to be trifled with.

Something that Satsuki remembered very well was a lesson given to her by her mother, when she had first met the Sandaime Hokage who had been anything but the strong, stoic and unapproachable man she'd expected from someone who carried a title like 'God of Shinobi'. In fact, he'd been the kind, grandfatherly type and made no secret of his love for children. Heck, there were, mostly confirmed, rumors circulating about that said the man randomly visited orphanages to bring candy and toys to the kids there.

The lesson Satsuki had learned that day?

Often times, power corrupts its holder. It's something that is bound to happen to just about everyone. Power brought arrogance, which produced a lot of behavior that Satsuki could now classify as 'Jerkassery'. In the ninja world, you often had to watch out for the arrogant ones, because more often than not, they have a reason to be arrogant douchebags. Being powerful enough to disregard the consequences invites one to exercise their newfound, oft imaginary, right to cruelty.

The truly powerful men, however? Truly powerful men scarcely flaunted their power. Truly powerful men downplayed their own strength, skill, wisdom, power, what have you. Truly powerful men had no need to constantly prove their strength to everyone. The Sandaime Hokage could afford to destroy his image as a powerful shinobi warlord entirely and without remorse. He didn't need such a thing.

Truly powerful men, that is applying to both genders, were nice because they could afford to be nice.

The gravity of that statement would only hit her later in life, after she'd come to understand what power was truly all about.

And ever since then, she'd been frightened of incurring the Third Hokage's wrath. That very night in which her eyes had been opened to the harsh reality of the world, she had seen the Hokage for what he truly was.

Satsuki would've continued musing about her situation, how she was so far behind all three of the powerful people in the room that it wasn't even funny, how she still needed to prove her strength at every turn and how she thirsted for more and more power… But there was a rather annoying blonde poking her cheek and derailing her train of thought every second.

"Yo, Satchan! Is anybody in there? You've been staring at the mister for like five minutes!"

The Uchiha was left to curse the interruption to her thoughts in silence.

"But I got here a minute ago." The man pointed out, raising an amused eyebrow and offering the blonde a little smile. "Ah, but where are my manners? I suppose I should introduce myself. Hello, my name is Nobunaga." The man stopped to gesture towards the brown haired woman. "That is my wife, Kichou." He said, before turning back to Naruto. "It's a pleasure to meet some of Konoha's newest genin."

"Hi, Nobunaga-san! I'm Naruto, this is Satsuki and that is Sakura!" Naruto spoke animatedly, pointing first at herself, then at Satsuki and lastly at Sakura. Then she threw an arm around each of her teammates' shoulders. "We're the most awesome team in all of Konoha!"

"Are you, now?" The brown haired woman asked, amused. "Well, I guess your mission time is the best in your age group, so far." Kichou said, tapping her lips as if deep in thought. "I guess I could reward you for this, oh so great of achievements. I've been meaning to visit Konoha's Hot Springs, and it'd be rather lonesome to do it by myself. Would you care to accompany me?"

"Somehow, I knew it'd end in this." Sarutobi mentioned off handedly.

"Ah, that sounds like a good idea." Nobunaga spoke, his approval clear in both tone and face. "As a matter of fact, we all should visit the hotsprings. I have a few aches I could do without." He continued, smiling widely. "What do you say, Kakashi-kun?" He asked, turning his head to a potted plant on one corner of the room.

To the surprise of only the genin, the plant quickly turned into a masked shinobi who yawned and looked a little bored. "That sounds nice." He spoke in a rather lazy drawl. "But wouldn't that throw your schedule out the window, Nobunaga-sama?"

"Most likely." The black haired man agreed, smiling. "But it isn't a big deal in the long run."

"If you say so…" Kakashi said, shrugging.

"Sensei, where were you?" Asked Satsuki accusingly.

"Yeah! You left us to do the mission on our own!" Sakura said.

"He's kinda useless anyway." Naruto remarked. "I don't think it would've made a difference." She continued, shrugging. Kakashi looked almost hurt by her assessment.

"You know, she's kinda right. You did get beaten by a group of genin fresh from the academy in a fight." Sarutobi seemed far too amused, and it didn't please Kakashi in the slightest to be the source of his leader's amusement. Usually, it was voluntary when he did something that was incredibly stupid and thus incredibly hilarious.

"I have a completely valid excuse this time. You see, I was on my way to the store to buy some catnip so I could make the entire mission a lesson about how the best plans are sometimes the simplest ones, when I ran into a princess who had been kidnapped and taken atop a construction zone by a monkey who kept throwing barrels at me when I went to rescue her. It took me a while, but I finally made it and when I got her down, she told me she couldn't thank me properly at the moment, as she had a few errands to run. So I accompanied her, you know, to make sure that nothing else happened while she was alone. Konoha is a big place, and someone who doesn't live here can easily get lost."

"… You can't be serious." Satsuki immediately countered, fully deadpan in delivery.

"Oh, but I am. You see, we stopped at six different drug stores, because none of them had what she was looking for, and then it turns out that what she was looking for wasn't a kind of medicine at all, she had read the note backwards. Turns out we actually had to backtrack all the way to the first drug store and so we found what she was looking for. That drugstore was on the other side of Konoha from where the girls were, so I decided to let them go through their mission alone because I didn't wanna walk that far."

"You could have just said 'I was lazy', you know." Sakura stated, dryly. There was no respect in her tone for her teacher, something that she would usually find preposterous. The thing was, Kakashi had done nothing but anger and annoy her ever since she'd began her actual ninja career.

"Yeah, well, that too." Kakashi admitted, scratching at his mask.

As if to punctuate the absurdity of the situation, a tiny monkey came rushing into the room, quickly finding Nobunaga and climbing all the way to his shoulder, settling there and looking at Sarutobi for a few seconds. The old man gave the monkey a half smile and a nod.

"I'm sorry for the interruption!" A rather high pitched voice cut through the silence as a little girl, around the same height as Naruto, came running in. In contrast with the austere Daimyo and his wife, the girl wore quite a few ornaments, some on her hair, others on the expensive and rather fine-looking yukata she wore. It was of a very dark blue color, with patterns of gold decorating it, and Naruto found her eyes mesmerized by the way that the seemed to flow as she moved.

Her teammates immediately assessed her as the most likely spoiled little daughter of the Daimyo.

"Kou-hime. It's always a pleasure to see you. I hadn't been made aware of your presence." Sarutobi quickly spoke, smiling and bending down as the little girl went to give the grandfatherly man a hug.

"Neither was I." Admitted the Daimyo, looking at his wife, in a fashion that showed everyone in the room that he was not all that displeased by this turn of events.

"It was… kind of a last minute decision…" Admitted Kou, scratching her cheek and blushing red in embarrassment. "You forgot your medicine, and I didn't want to send a courier for something so trivial, so…"

"But that's what we have couriers for, Kou." Nobunaga informed the little girl, kneeling and patting her head as he did. "Well, it doesn't matter, just remember to send word ahead next time, okay?"

"Uhm… But I did. I gave the letter to that nice silver haired man." She said, turning to face Kakashi, who sheepishly offered the letter to the fire Daimyo.

"I meant far in advance." Nobunaga explained, sighing.

"As in 'Before you set out'." Kichou helpfully explained.

"Well, that explains what you were doing while your team did their jobs." Sarutobi spoke, sounding slightly amused at the whole turn of events. "Kou-hime, did you really get attacked by a barrel-throwing monkey?"

"Y-Yes, I did. It was weird." Kou explained, blushing slightly. "He kept screaming something about plumbers."

"Toukichirou, was that one of your friends?" Asked Nobunaga, turning to the monkey on his shoulder.

Said monkey vehemently shook his head, then shrugged.

"I'll ask Enma later if he knows anything about the monkey. Konohamaru might have found the monkey summoning contract and there's a chance he got Asuma to teach him how to summon. He wouldn't lose a chance to create a little havoc and annoy me." The Sandaime theorized, rubbing his chin. "Well then, I guess we can file this mission as a total, if disastrous, success."

"Don't worry, girls, I'll pay for your new clothes, too. It's the least I can do." Kichou immediately turned to address the girls of Team 7, who seemed slightly defeated by the entire debacle.

"Oh, that's great, because the jacket I'm wearing now? It's kind of falling apart, and having no pockets would get real annoying after a while." Naruto explained, noting that her jacket's pockets were in the shredded lower half.

"You could wear, you know, pants." Sakura spoke.

"But that would be uncomfortable!" Naruto whined.

Satsuki barely resisted the urge to punch the blonde.


	10. Visitation of Woe

It was a normal day at Konoha's Hot Springs. The ones that were not unisex, anyway. On the ones that were, as a matter of fact, unisex, Jiraiya would've had the worst day of his life as it happened to be the day in which the asylum for the elderly and disabled was visiting en masse and had thus reserved the place.

Naruto had proceeded to whine about it the entire way to the other ones. Kakashi was not certain whether to be flattered or worried that his students thought he might be a pretty boy under the mask he wore. Or maybe he should be horrified about the many, many possible disfigurements that Satsuki theorized he could be hiding under his mask.

Even the Daimyo, his wife and his little sister had ended up somehow joining the guessing game.

Ultimately, they'd arrived at the newest looking Hot Springs in the village, built with specific, anti-Jiraiya measures (or so they advertised, anyway). Kakashi had gone ahead and entered, pointing with his finger at the Daimyo behind him and ignoring the stunned faces of the staff. It'd taken him but a couple of minutes to give his body a full wash and even less to find something to tie to his face so it'd act as a mask.

The Hot Springs were pretty much standard and unassuming. A pool that was basically a shallow hole on the rock that had pleasantly warm water filling it. There was a, from sight alone, sturdy wooden palisade dividing both sides, which didn't bother Kakashi in the least.

If he wanted to peek, he wouldn't do it from the hot springs themselves. After all, he owned a telescope, so there was no need to risk proximity.

Kakashi sighed in contentment almost submerging in the hot and relaxing water. However, he found himself incapable of fully relaxing, feeling a bit worried as he saw the face that the Daimyo of the Land of Fire made. It looked not unlike someone who was in way more pain than he liked to admit he was. He was also walking with a noticeably strained step, as if he was afraid of putting too much pressure on the ground. Considering the floor was the hard stone that bordered the spring itself, it seemed entirely unnecessary.

"So you do wear a mask even here…" Nobunaga spoke, letting out a suffering sigh. "I just lost ten thousand Ryo, you know."

Kakashi raised an eyebrow. "I'm not even gonna ask." He spoke, with all the respect of a petulant child towards the man who sponsored Konoha.

"Oooh! So nice and soft!"

Kakashi blinked. Nobunaga blinked. "Naruto?"

Both the ninja and the civilian seemed entirely entranced by the sounds coming from the other side of the palisade, because it sounded too good to be true. Let it not go unsaid that Kakashi was a fan of slapstick comedy, because it was the kind of comedy he enjoyed the most. Particularly when the moronic, elitist character got what was coming to him and learned a necessary lesson.

While this wouldn't have the same… pathos… it certainly would give Kakashi a laugh or two to listen to Satsuki's distress while Naruto went about being Naruto, as well as Sakura's frustration. Comedy dictates that someone has to suffer, and Kakashi thought he'd suffered enough in his life to be a willing target, so the genin offering themselves to provide comedy targets for him was always a plus.

Some would say he was an ass for deriving enjoyment from his genin's antics, but he would say that he was an ass because he doesn't even remember how many kids his own age he killed during the Third World War, so it didn't make a difference.

"Naruto, I swear, if you keep disrespecting Kichou-sama I will end you." Came the dangerously low voice of Sakura. And then Kakashi remembered that the (admittedly very attractive) wife of the Daimyo was also on the other half of the springs.

"Flattery is hardly disrespect, Sakura-chan!" Came Naruto's carefree voice.

"It's not flattery, it's harassment!" Sakura yelled, clearly frustrated. From her voice alone, Kakashi could tell that her face was likely red and not from the heat. He wondered the face that Satsuki had during the entire exchange. Maybe she was just trying to pretend she didn't know either of the idiots.

"Don't worry about it, it's totally okay, I don't mind." Kakashi almost laughed at the strained yelp Sakura gave right then and there, but he had to keep himself silent lest he advertise the fact that he was listening in on their conversation. Kichou seemed like the kind of authority figure he could get behind, from her words alone. "Naruto-chan, this is your first time seeing ones like mine, right?"

"Yep!" Naruto answered, sounding far too happy. "Do they really get that large?"

"Well, mine aren't all that large." The grown woman admitted. "If I had to guess, I'd say that you will probably get ones bigger than mine when you grow up." She continued.

"Wouldn't that be totally uncomfortable? I mean, they seem heavy…" That was Sakura. Apparently, if Kichou thought it was okay to speak of the matter, then Sakura thought so too.

"They aren't all that heavy, but larger ones do tend to strain the back when you try to use them."

Kakashi then leaned back. "You know, it's at times like these that it turns out that we grossly misinterpreted the conversation and they turn out to be talking about something totally innocent in the end." He remarked, tapping his covered chin in thought.

"No. I know my wife." Nobunaga answered. "I doubt it."

Meanwhile, on the other side of the palisade, Satsuki tried to forget she had come with that same group. "I am surrounded by idiots and perverts." She murmured to herself.

"Yeah, but it's nice like that." The one seated next to her, a girl that was around her age more or less, yet seemed almost two years younger if she had to guess, from her small size and the lack of training making her seem all the more innocent. "It's fun." She added.

Satsuki rolled her eyes. "For you, maybe."

"Yes, it is fun for me… but you're enjoying it too, aren't you?" asked the black haired girl, smiling widely. Satsuki scoffed, but that did not deter the princess of the Land of Fire. "If you weren't, you wouldn't have smiled when you said that."

Satsuki blinked. "It must have been a trick of the water vapor."

"Well, I guess it doesn't matter." Kou spoke, looking at her with a kind smile that spoke of wisdom beyond her years. Wisdom brought from something Satsuki knew well, but she wondered how the little girl with no shinobi training nor awareness of the world outside the sphere of royalty could know pain. "But still, you should enjoy it while you can. After all, you never know when the things you love will be taken from you."

And that, the pain of losing what you hold most dear... That Satsuki knew well, much as she wished she didn't.

* * *

The last loyal Uchiha narrowed her eyes. "You." She said, crossing her arms.

The most surprising Hyuuga offered her a kind smile. "Me." She replied, folding her arms in a demure fashion. "It's nice to see you, Satsuki-san." She said, causing a shiver to run down Satsuki's spine. No one as sick and twisted as Hinata was should be able to smile that way. Satsuki was absolutely certain that Hinata was doing so entirely to throw her off her game.

It wouldn't work. Not this time. She wouldn't be helpless again. "What do you want?" She asked, making damn sure to keep an eye trained on the crazy bitch that had made her fear her nightmares once again with such startling ease. Despite the rough shock, she knew for a fact that she could take Hinata on in a fight… and this time, the Hyuuga wouldn't have the element of surprise to even out the score. "You don't scare me." Her voice might have solemn, calm and certain, but she knew, deep down, that she was lying.

Hinata scared her.

Hinata was sick, twisted and damaged in the head. Hinata was someone who had threatened to take away the reasons for Satsuki's existence with the same kind smile that she spoke about the greatness of her beloved. In short, Hinata was insane, plain and simple, and that made her unpredictable.

For an Uchiha, someone who valued predicting her enemies' moves even before they thought them up, having someone as unpredictably insane as Hinata around was an utterly terrifying concept. It didn't help that the only one vaguely aware of the depths of Hinata's insanity was Satsuki herself, and she doubted her word would hold much in the way of weight if she were to accuse the heiress of the Hyuuga clan of being the monster she was.

The Jyuuken did not leave sufficient physical marks and the chakra residue faded as soon as the effects did, which meant that there really was no way to prove that there was any form of combat between then… though then again, she couldn't call that combat. Not truly.

"What do I want?" Hinata asked, gasping. "You offend me! I have watched you from afar. I have watched you with Naruto-chan… and you make her happy." Hinata spoke, beginning to walk and circling Satsuki, making damn sure to show that she was completely open to attack. Satsuki instantly knew that she was up to something, because otherwise she wouldn't show herself as openly as this.

If she had to make a guess, Satsuki would say that Hinata likely counted on Satsuki being politically savvy enough not to attack her. Unlike the Hyuuga, who only needed to tap her opponent to inflict damage enough to incapacitate, whatever Satsuki did would leave marks, and Hinata's word held much weight, due to the personality she superimposed over the insanity of her true self.

Satsuki could only grudgingly admit that Hinata was acting like a true ninja.

"Like I spoke to you, if Naruto-chan is happy, so am I, Satsuki-san." Hinata spoke, offering her a big smile. "It's a pity that you're too much of a coward and an idiot to act on your true feelings, but… Perhaps it's for the best." The supposedly shy Hyuuga mused. "Your accursed blood can do no good, after all."

All logical thought left Satsuki's mind as she growled and launched herself at the genin that was mercilessly mocking her family. Hinata barely had time to even blink as she was punched and thrown halfway across the alley that they had met in. Coincidentally, the same one as last time. Hinata grunted as he landed against the wall, using it to hold herself upright and look at the standing Uchiha.

"How dare you!?" the near snarl that came from Satsuki's mouth seemed to strike a chord within Hinata, because it caused her to flinch. Nonetheless, the Hyuuga regained her composure with rather startling ease, which caused Satsuki's rage to bubble further. "Have you no shame!? Are you such a monster that you would speak ill of the dead!? ANSWER, you bitch!" All thoughts of maintaining secrecy had gone to hell as she advanced on the downed Uchiha.

When Hinata kept her silence, Satsuki kicked her on the side, forcing her to lay on the floor. No reaction was given, and Satsuki growled as she took a step back, trying to calm herself. "Is this all it takes to get you all riled up and ready to walk into an ambush? I am disappointed." Hinata spoke, standing up as she did and dusting herself off. She absent mindedly rubbed her cheek. It'd certainly swell in a short time. "You are dangerous… to yourself. But more importantly, you are dangerous to your teammates."

"Who do you think you are!?" Satsuki growled out, eyes narrow and anger evident.

"Me?" Hinata asked, smiling. "I'm simply a concerned person. Perhaps you need a less… subtle reminder of why discretion is the most important part of bravery." Hinata spoke, nodding to herself. Then she formed a single handseal with her hand…

… And pain lanced through Satsuki's body, starting with what felt like a bolt of lightning coming from her shin and riding straight up from there. She dropped to her knees at the feeling of pain, her sight going hazy and most of her body numb within a minute. She almost didn't feel the slap that knocked her to the floor.

"Simple work, a shock tag. Simpler still to attach it to your leg when you kicked me." Hinata explained. "Your hot head can cost you your life. If you cause your own death, then that will be that… but if your idiocy is to be paid by your teammates' blood…" The words were left to hang, as Hinata turned around and left. As she left the alley, a vaguely humanoid black shape appeared in a flurry of leaves and wind, though Satsuki's sight was still covered in swimming black shapes when the two left.

"This is going too far…" She heard someone mutter, and thought the voice sounded oddly familiar… However, she couldn't concentrate, as exhaustion and an abused nervous system caught up to her and she was out like a light the moment she felt someone's arms encircle her.

* * *

"Satchan!" The yell broke through the cloud that had made Satsuki completely unresponsive to the outside world. A flash of golden, spiky locks in motion had Satsuki suddenly aware that she was awake, and she blinked what sleep she could away. It wouldn't do to be vulnerable when she was in the same room as Naruto.

It never was a good idea to be vulnerable in the same room as Naruto. The girl had a sadistic streak and seemed to absolutely love teasing Satsuki when she couldn't defend herself.

"I was so worried! Seriously, what's with you disappearing during the night!? I couldn't sleep because I kept thinking that you could be out there, training and becoming stronger so you'd leave me and Sakura to bite your dust!" She ranted, pacing back and forth, throwing her arms around as she did.

Careful groping told Satsuki that she was in her bed. She'd only been in Naruto's bed once, and she wished never to repeat the experience. Regardless of that, she wondered how she'd gotten there, because the last thing she remembered was getting knocked unconscious by Hinata. The thought almost made her growl, and it definitely sent her to brood once again. Oh, how she wanted to find and strangle the Hyuuga…

… How she wanted to wipe that smug smirk off her face (had she been smirking? Satsuki couldn't tell, but she certainly hoped there was a smug smirk to wipe the floor with…), but… She couldn't deny that the Hyuuga had been correct. Because Satsuki was nothing if not an intelligent child, and she knew her own defects when they were pointed out.

She was not so arrogant as to deny the fact that she could possess flaws. Well, so long as someone she recognized as superior or equal was the one to point them out, of course. No need to listen to those who were beneath her, after all… Most of the time. Sometimes, truly insightful things came from her lesser peers, which she'd acknowledge when she realized their wisdom.

Which was usually never.

"… And then I made ramen but you just wouldn't come back and so I got worried and I kinda ate it all and then I had to make more but you didn't have any so I was forced to just go for the vegetable soup that was originally going to be the broth and so here's it!" Naruto said, with a bright and cheerful smile, as she handed Satsuki a medium sized bowl of steaming hot soup, recently heated.

Wow, the girl could really talk a mile a minute if she got going. Good thing Satsuki was used to tuning out the droning of people as intelligent as shoes back at the academy, otherwise she might have just gotten her brain rotted for her trouble. Regardless, the soup was, as usual of anything made by Naruto, absolutely excellent. She couldn't help but moan at the taste, as the blonde knew very well of Satsuki's love for tomatoes and had wasted little time in giving her a bigger share of them.

It was odd to see them in this kind of soup, but it didn't matter, as Satsuki found them delicious in any shape or form, though she hadn't been able to convince anyone to make Tomato Ice Cream for her…

At some point, Naruto had dragged her to the kitchen that also served as Satsuki's emergency study (because she never used the spice shelves and had thus stuck many of the books she'd used to further her training in the place of their intended occupants), sat her down and proceeded to eat with her as if it weren't very nearly the next day already (which would give them four hours of sleep, five if they hurried up with their preparations that morning and skipped some things, of sleep), trying to engage Satsuki in her inane chatter.

And, much to her own surprise, Satsuki found herself smiling when Naruto, being distracted as she was, accidentally splashed her face with hot soup, having missed her mouth entirely. Satsuki had grabbed a napkin (when had the blonde gotten the time needed to set a proper table?) and used it to clean the blonde's face, causing her to blush intensely in embarrassment at being treated by a child.

It felt sweet to have revenge on the one most likely to humiliate her, Satsuki thought. It did help that she was also the cause of Satsuki's current feud with Hinata. The teams hadn't had much in the way of inter-team bonding, but it was still early in their careers. There would most likely be some sort of joint training or exercise. Konoha prided itself on the teamwork that allowed it to remain the strongest of the five great villages despite its shinobi being overall less impressive than the likes of Kumo or Iwa.

Save the rare prodigious nutcase, of course. Konoha spawned a few of those every generation, after all, and did so at a faster rate than any other village. A frown marred the pretty features of the last loyal Uchiha when she realized that she couldn't truly call herself one of those prodigies. Not while she was so far behind the curve…

… Not while even the shy, gentle, kind and absolutely insane Hyuuga Heiress could still defeat her through such simple tricks. He would have seen past them. He would have subverted her tricks. He would never have been caught and defeated by anyone his age.

"Hey! You're spacing out!" Naruto called, looking slightly annoyed. She sighed, then. "You must be tired… I would've let you sleep, but then you would've had to go without. Sakura-chan said that's a big no-no, and she's gotta regulate her diet really carefully. I don't see the point, really, I eat whatever I want whenever I want and I'm just fine!"

Satsuki wanted to point out that Naruto was a freak of nature. Then again, Naruto also grew the most delicious vegetables in the world, according to Satsuki's humble opinion anyway, and ate plenty of them. While she had a deficiency in the meat department whenever she chose to eat alone, she did not do so very often (because Satsuki would rather train than waste time learning how to cook, and thus Naruto had just picked up the slack and shared her lunch with Satsuki, who had quickly grown tired of ramen and demanded a much larger variety).

All in all, Naruto had apparently unconsciously and unknowingly stumbled upon a decent enough diet to accommodate her lifestyle. Then again, it certainly didn't add up to the blonde's boundless stamina and peerless chakra quantities. Satsuki ate very nearly the same (with the occasional skipped meal) and didn't have anywhere near as good stamina, or anywhere near as big chakra reserves (although, admittedly, those were more of a hindrance than a boon at their age).

They finished their meal and threw the bowls in the sink, where the rest of the utensils Naruto had used still lay, and shortly afterwards they worked as a well oiled machine, brought from experience more than anything else, to deal with them as quickly as possible. It was funny that despite their horrible teamwork whenever anything ninja was involved, they synchronized pretty well when it came to food.

Of course, Satsuki never did seem to notice during those times that she had actually let Naruto take the lead and, following her cue, she was much more efficient in the boring task of washing the dishes. Plus, everything was always better when you had someone to share the misery with. Like they say, misery loves company.

It didn't take long for Satsuki to kick Naruto out of her house, almost physically pushing her all the way to the door that connected her apartment to the hallway that lead to Naruto's own, not too far away, but...

That stupid pout. Too stupidly adorable. It had made Satsuki sigh, declare how annoyed she was with the arrangement, and telling Naruto that yes, she could sleep in her bed again.

Not that she could blame the blonde for wanting to get as far away from that fiendishly evil mattress she owned…

Regret came instantly when Naruto proved that her boundless energy was still in effect, moving in bed so much that it annoyed the Uchiha, but when the blonde had settled (annoyingly close and in too much contact for Satsuki to be comfortable at all), she had begun to hum a soothing melody, doing so in such a soft way that Satsuki found herself without much in the way of objections.

And so, swayed by the gentle, soothing melody, Satsuki drifted off to sleep, returning to the land of dreams.

Once again, without her knowledge, she'd find her dreams free of nightmares, the smile on her face being the only display of such. Naruto then pulled the Uchiha girl closer to herself, watching the dark haired girl as she moved in such a way that it allowed her to increase the amount of physical contact, as well as turn around so they were face to face.

Satsuki's face scrunched up, as if she were feeling distressed.

"I'll make the bad dreams go away, Satchan…"

The blonde placed her lips softly against the raven haired girl's forehead, murmuring a few undecipherable words that sounded soothing. Any sign of distress cleared from Satsuki's face as she once again resumed her sweet dreams.

Naruto smiled one final time and drifted off to sleep herself.

* * *

Jeez, with all those oneshots I've been doing lately, I keep forgetting to thank everyone for their reviews! I feel like a total dick about it, too! So, sorry for that, doods! I'll try not to let it happen again.

Anyway, since nobody can get who the wind daimyo is right without a clue, I'll provide one for y'all! It is a man who is obsessed with beauty, although I personally disagree with his perception of what is beautiful and what is not.


	11. We're On A Boat!

Like always, thanks to everyone who took the time to leave me a review. While the art of writing is something I engage on entirely for my own pleasure, I wouldn't be posting if I wasn't interested in knowing your opinions and reactions.

That's something that's always been kinda funny, ain't it? I mean, I can understand writing something for your own enjoyment, but... if you're not interested in others' opinions, whether they like or dislike your work, why post it? Alas, I shall never know the answer to this most vexing of matters.

I... guess I ought to warn you guys that Satsuki and Sakura... will not be having a good time, here. Thought you should know that not all I write in this fic is as fluffy as Naruto and Satsuki's relationship.

* * *

"Why are we here again?" Sakura asked, turning to Satsuki and looking not unlike she was being subjected to the worst sort of torture imaginable. 'Here', in this particular instance, happened to be a rather sizable civilian cruiser that was part deluxe yacht and part casino boat. Normally, these tended to be illegal and thus hired missing nin who wouldn't blab for their security.

However, this time it all happened to be legal and approved by the necessary officials… because it was an international boat that limited itself to the gambling regulations present in the countries it visited and the other… entertainment… present was also very much legal in most nations.

It was a diplomatic mission which involved all five great nations in one of the Fire Daimyo's more noticeable efforts to maintain the peace between the ninja villages, understandable given how bloody and costly their wars were. Of course, he'd actively asked for Team 7 to be the guards who were to represent Konoha in this.

None of the active members of Team 7, except Kakashi, knew that they were chosen because Oda Nobunaga believed they represented the values Konoha liked to spouse better than anyone else. Team 7 had been separated, with Naruto being assigned to the upper deck, where the nobles gathered (mostly for her ability to pass herself off as a cute little waitress) and the other two, Sakura and Satsuki, being assigned to guard the kitchens (because Satsuki kept glaring at everyone who so much as eyed her body and Sakura had been far too nervous to join Naruto).

This, after the third day, had them both sick of all the white everywhere and the smell of the delicious food they'd never taste and would be forced to just watch as it went by to serve the rich, leaving the kunoichi that made sure that food wasn't tampered with to starve in the kitchens. Not fair at all. At least, the crew of the kitchens shared their own meals with them.

"Because Naruto whined and threw a tantrum about our shitty D ranks." From her language alone, it was clear that Satsuki was incensed to a point beyond human thought. Indeed, she was so angry that her anger could power the entirety of Konoha for three weeks, two days and six hours. She was a very specific person when it came to her anger level. That came from several anger management classes (that never worked to stop Naruto from sending her into righteous fury).

"I don't know what she was complaining about, usually she has fun doing them." Sakura spoke, sighing and rubbing the bridge of her nose In clear exasperation. "Why did we have to take this one, though?"

That's when Kakashi came from behind them, placing a hand on each of their foreheads and making a right mess of their carefully groomed hairs when he actually got his hands in position to do so. He was, very clearly, drunk off his ass. "Because I deserve fun every once in a while too, don't you think?"

He moved with the certain sway of a drunk man who couldn't control his limbs quite right and seeing how he was leaning on them for support, despite being much taller than them, he would quite likely fall face first on the floor if they shrugged him off their shoulders.

Plus the smell. That one made it obvious.

"You're always having fun. In fact, do you even train?" Satsuki mused. "You certainly don't teach us much."

"You wound me, Satsuki! Right here!" Kakashi spoke, gesturing towards his heart. "Wait, no, you don't. 'Cause I'm not gonna train you guys until you can work together well, and while you can get your act together when things are going smoothly, so far, I've yet to see you guys work well under pressure. So I decided to use a C rank mission as a test to see if you guys are ready to actually start real training." The silver haired jounin explained.

Sakura blinked. "Wow. I didn't think sensei could be this honest." She commented, looking at Satsuki, who nodded in agreement with the sentiment of her words.

"I'm a very honest drunk." Kakashi said, proudly. "Or maybe I'm a pirate who's using a henge to look like the famous Copycat Ninja, poured alcohol on myself and acted drunk so you wouldn't notice the discrepancies in character between me and the actual Kakashi." The silver haired man spoke, raising his head slightly.

"Pirates?" Sakura asked, raising an eyebrow. "We're on the kitchens of a heavily guarded deluxe cruiser. Besides, there hasn't been another ship in sight in the last four hours, how would anyone have boarded us?"

Kakashi shook his head. "Maybe they infiltrated the ship beforehand? You've gotta think this through." He informed, yawning as he did. "This thing has stopped on sixteen ports…"

Satsuki snorted. "We're still deep inside the ship, which is guarded by several genin teams from various countries. There are at least two dozen genin and at least eight jounin aboard the ship. What kind of idiot pirate would try to take it?"

"It could happen. There are very daring criminals out there." Kakashi said, making his single eye make that weird smile thing. "Why, there are some who could sneak up on me, knock me out, tie me up, lock me in a closet for cleaning supplies and do the same with several of the other shinobi so that they could take out all the genin teams at once."

"That would require a ridiculous amount of preparation. Far more than any two bit pirate could pull off. Not to mention, the ability necessary to pull off such convincing transformations would put most of the shinobi involved in such an elaborate ambush at a level in which they could just hold the genin hostage instead of trying to go for the much harder target that the jounin present." Sakura spoke, rolling her eyes.

"You're absolutely correct!" Kakashi said, ruffling her hair a little and smiling widely under his mask.

"… Oh, shit." Satsuki spoke, eyes widening, as every muscle in her body tensed at once. She tried to elbow the man who had an arm around her shoulders, but she felt a horrible shock come from her forehead, numbing all of her muscles at once.

Sakura didn't get the opportunity to even try to get out of the situation before she was similarly stopped from doing anything.

The fake Kakashi exploded into smoke, revealing a man in a long red coat trimmed in gold, with similarly golden buttons that glinted with the artificial light of the hallway that lead to the kitchens. Even the epaulettes on his shoulders seemed polished. The hat on the man's head was similarly fancy, being the standard pirate captain had with a skull and crossbones done in golden thread. The man wasted no time in tying them up, pulling at their restraints to make sure they held tight.

Both of them were made incapable of even squirming loose by the tight bondage that kept their arms locked in place being tied in such a way that pulling anywhere on the rope would tighten a knot somewhere else, causing pain that would disrupt the concentration necessary for an escapist's technique. Usually by way of choking them whenever they moved their arms or legs.

"You two girls really need a whole lot more training." The man informed, cracking his neck. "You've got a very famous teacher who's very easy to imitate for short periods of time." He added, licking his lips as he did. "I have to say, it was real fun stalking you gals."

"H-How did you… know… that Sensei… didn't train us..?" Sakura asked, gasping in between every few words, feeling the pain of her shock. Seeing this, Satsuki grit her teeth, looking up at the grinning pirate after she confirmed that Sakura wasn't as affected as she might seem at first glance.

"Well, it's what you two have been complaining about for the last three days." The Pirate said, shrugging. "Anyway, you might be noticing your chakra being difficult to grasp right now. You see, that seal I put on your foreheads earlier gave you an electric shock that caused a certain drug you've been ingesting for the last three days to kick into action. Usually, it's harmless, but when an electric shock courses through the blood that contains it, it happens to relax the body in such a way that molding chakra becomes nigh impossible. Nifty little thing, that. Using that on my former jounin sensei so I could rape her, I did love her tight little ass I must say, was what got me kicked out of Kiri. The funny thing is that if I had killed her, nobody would've batted an eyelash."

"…Please tell me this isn't going where I think it's going." Satsuki said, the slightest bit of panic filtering into her voice. The same panic that had seized Sakura and made her freeze up at the implication of the pirate's words. Satsuki, meanwhile, was thinking about how she was gonna rip the cooks apart when she got out of her bonds.

"Oh, goodness, no!" The Pirate yelled, shaking his head. "You're what, twelve? You don't even have tits and your asses are no different from a boy's, and I'm very straight, thank you. Heck, I don't think you're big enough to take me in yet. Maybe in a few years, if you're still alive." He said, rubbing his chin and grinning widely. "Yep! You'll both grow up into very fine ladies, most kunoichi do." He said, nodding to himself. "But right now, you wouldn't be able to give me an erection no matter how hard you tried."

"Fuck you." Satsuki said, surprisingly offended at being told she wasn't good enough for a goddamn filthy rapist.

"Maybe in three years, girly." The man said, giving her a lecherous grin. "Anyway, the boys at the kitchens aren't as picky as me. They'll be here for you two in a few minutes at the most. Wait here, okay? Don't move a muscle!" He said, in a condescending tone that seemed as if he were talking to a naughty and bratty little kid. He had also crouched down, making the black material of his pants bunch up and opening his coat, showing that he had a relatively short blade held on a belt, the once pure white sheath now yellowed with age and innumerable stains that were never cleaned, which meant he was probably proficient enough in combat that Satsuki didn't really trust her chances.

Satsuki growled, while Sakura whimpered. The man chuckled.

"I'm gonna go look for your third teammate. Now that girl I'll keep as a personal pet. You two will be beautiful when you grow up, no doubt, but the kind of beauty that girl will be only comes once every hundred years or so. I'm afraid you don't meet my standards, gals." The man was ugly, with several missing teeth, the remaining ones being blackened and clearly rotting, so his smile was even uglier. His face carried the scars of combat, missing half of his lower lip as well as his right eye and a chunk of his nose.

The white ruffled shirt he wore had several holes that allowed Satsuki to peer past it, showing the many scars on the man's chest.

She cursed softly, it was clear this guy was out of her league if he'd survived to have that many scars being a pirate. Criminals didn't survive those kinds of wounds if they lost the fights that caused them.

The only part that was remotely clean about the man was the immaculate red coat and hat. Then again, the coat was the very color of blood, so it was possible it just wasn't noticeable…

And then the man turned around, the quick movement flaring his cloak around him, and left, his step quick and his movements hasty. Satsuki smirked, knowing that the man left quickly because it was very likely that something had gone horribly wrong in his plans. Soon, she understood why she got that feeling since the sounds of battle came with an explosion of noise, literally since an explosion was the first thing they heard.

"Sakura." Satsuki began, wiggling over so she could see Sakura's wrists tied together, then worming her way to her. "I'm gonna try to bite through the ropes." She informed, her tone even and calm.

Sakura, still frightened by the thought of meeting the most horrible fate explained to them by the academy, for either kunoichi or shinobi, simply nodded and tried to calm herself. A glance at her face told Satsuki that Sakura was barely holding her tears of frustration, anger and fear in. It was, if nothing else, a valiant struggle.

The Uchiha didn't know if she'd be just as terrified if she hadn't already had a moment that was very much in the 'Worst Moment In My Life' category already. Oh, she was certainly afraid, but her pride didn't let her fear overcome her… not again. She'd already let her fear overcome her once when dealing with the insane Hyuuga Heiress, and she knew that it wouldn't be productive in the least.

So, the Uchiha set herself to her task, deciding not to try and speak words of comfort and encouragement to Sakura. Actions spoke louder than words, after all.

* * *

Kakashi was not having a good day. First, the waiter tried to kill him, so he had to kill him in turn. He'd stabbed the man with a kitchen knife through the ear. The knife had broken and Kakashi had been left weaponless, because he had been on the deluxe yacht's pool at that moment and thus wearing only his mask (a special version that wasn't part of his shirt and covered his Sharingan too) and a Speedo (because the ladies deserved to see the epitome of sexy that was his body), which gave him nowhere to hide his kunai and shuriken, his favored weapons since he broke his father's blade.

Then, the other waiter tried to kill him, except this one carried no weapons. Kakashi had been forced to engage in hand to hand with a pirate who clearly knew what he was doing. Of course, Kakashi wasn't a legendary ninja for nothing and still managed to easily outmaneuver the man who could have easily been made a genin in a ninja village with that kind of skill. He broke that guy's neck.

Ah, if only the waitress hadn't attacked him too. He could've sworn he saw her eyeing his groin earlier, and he had been looking to sample the pleasures of her flesh. Unfortunately, that plan was ruined when he broke her spine by bending her over his knee in a way she wasn't meant to bend. Bummer, that.

The fact that he'd utterly terrified even the other jounin with the speed and efficiency of his kills only reminded him that he really was frikkin' awesome at what he did, and he nodded to the two jounin who immediately came to him for leadership, despite both being his seniors. One was from Suna, though given that Kakashi didn't recognize him it was likely he was a pretty junior jounin, and the other was also a rookie jounin from Konoha, from the prior graduating class.

"Find your teams. They'll target our genin to hold them hostage. Find and guard the clients you were assigned." Kakashi drawled, bored with the situation he'd been in a million times already. "Priority is your clients, send clones for your teams."

Both of the other jounin nodded and went off, following Kakashi's advice. The Copy Ninja yawned and, with a single handsign, produced five shadow clones. The clones nodded before shooting into separated directions.

Kakashi then turned to his audience, the other patrons who had been enjoying the pool, and noticed that there were sizable holes in the crowd where the six assassins that had been there at the time were terminated. Too much blood for it to belong solely to the attackers, Kakashi mused, which meant that the jounin were even worse than Kakashi had guessed at first glance.

They promoted anyone these days…

"Folks, so long as I'm here, you will be safe. Please do not move from this deck-"

"B-B-But my family!" A fat man who had a slim woman (who was one of the worker girls the boat had hired) in a tiny bikini hanging off his arm yelled, getting up and making a move to head towards the ladder that would take him to the upper deck that held the entrance to the upper class chambers where his family was likely hiding from the commotion.

"- under any circumstances." Kakashi said, glaring at the man with his one eye. "Your families will be safe, since they'd be more valuable as hostages than as corpses. Well, so long as nobody does anything stupid, anyway." The silver haired jounin yawned again.

"W-Why are you so bored?!" One of the fearful waitresses, dressed in a ridiculously tiny maid outfit which showed her bikini below nearly in full, asked. The outfits, designed with the fetish in mind, happened to fit Naruto perfectly, which made Kakashi snicker. She'd been popular entirely due to the moe factor she carried, though Kakashi wouldn't put it far past some of the less respectable nobles around to have less than innocent intentions…

"I've been doing this kind of thing since I was six." Kakashi spoke, shrugging at the awe he saw in the girl's face. "I'm not world famous for nothing, you know?" He boasted, winking at the girl. While most would ask just what the hell he was doing flirting at a time like this, Kakashi would answer that he was braking the tension and keeping them distracted. Making sure that nobody did something entirely idiotic due to the tension.

Of course, unlike the other, distracted people who surrounded the swimming pool, he was fully alert and thus could very easily intercept the knife thrown at the back of his head by an over eager pirate with the most delectable pair of tits he'd ever seen. He'd, of course, immediately thrown it back and punched it straight through her eye into her brain, killing her instantly and making her fall back, toppling over the railing and into the lowest deck, which was populated mostly by the servants of the many nobles aboard.

"Woah! That was amazing, jounin-san!"

"Well, I am amazing." Kakashi said, offering everyone a one-eyed smile. He also expertly hid his anger at himself for throwing the knife back. He should have kept it, because he was still weapon-less and that was bound to cause trouble after. Oh well, no use dwelling on it at this point.

More than one person was looking a little green, seeing the brutal way he'd dispatched most of his attackers and how easy it was for him to kill people. Heck, it'd take him thirty seconds tops to kill everyone on the deck, make it a minute or two if the other two jounin were present. Three if they pulled their heads out of their asses long enough to work together against him.

"Trust me, you're perfectly safe with me and as we speak, my clones are taking care of anyone who might have snuck into your rooms to steal from you or hold any of your family hostage to secure your cooperation." He neglected to say that only three of his clones had been sent on that task, while the other two had gone to fetch his genin students.

He really hadn't expected the mission to go this wrong, and he knew for a fact that his team wasn't prepared for this. While not as strong as ninja trained by a formal academy, these pirates had experience and age over his students, and that accounted for a lot when it came to combat. The skills necessary to perform an infiltration on this level were all too deadly in single combat.

Kakashi took a small comfort in knowing that the fact that his students were very pretty young girls meant that they likely wouldn't be killed, and hoped against hope that his clones would get to them fast enough to prevent the ugly fate that surely awaited them. He dearly wished to go ensure their safety himself, particularly Naruto's (she was on the other side of the damn ship! He should've known something was up when the teams got separated from their jounin, but he'd assumed it had been done on the whims of the nobles who wanted to keep the jounin close!), but Kakashi was nothing if he wasn't a soldier, so he endured, because he had to do his duty.

The jounin grit his teeth as he easily saw beyond the sloppy genjutsu that washed over him while three assassins jumped at him, all from behind. The idiots had forgotten to mask the sound of their approach, and Kakashi scarcely needed his eyes to fight in melee range. Closing his remaining eye, he became a whirlwind of nearly-naked murder.

Leaving the genjutsu caster alive was a chore, but very much necessary. Uncovering his Sharingan, Kakashi hoisted the man up and dangled him over the pool. Both of the man's arms were broken, possibly beyond repair, while Kakashi held onto his legs, so there wasn't much he could do about it. "And now, you're gonna tell me what I want to know or I will have to do very unpleasant things to you."

The man whimpered in fear, but as Kakashi got ready to start asking, a blood curdling scream cut through the grim silence.

* * *

For all who have guessed, none have gotten it right! ALL of the Daimyo in the elemental countries are characters from Sengoku Rance. While nothing more than fun little cameos that don't truly merit a crossover, I still like keeping a bit of consistency in my work... even if I generally suck at it.

I've given you enough clues already, but I guess one more wouldn't hurt... The Daimyo of the Wind Country is rich, but all the money in the world couldn't help him become emperor no matter his lineage.

I have said far more than enough! Let it be known that the prize, an omake wherein something you want to happen happens (so long as it doesn't violate the Terms of Service for FF dot Net), still stands!


	12. Cut Short

It didn't take all that long for Satsuki to curse her impossibly dull teeth as she'd utterly and completely failed to chew through Sakura's bonds fast enough. It did not take a genius to know that both she and the pinkette were in deep shit, and she didn't even want to think about what would happen. A whole crowd's worth of stomps were the herald that told her that the kitchen workers turned pirates had arrived.

When they were thrown carelessly into the table at the center of the room where various foods had been prepared before, the two kunoichi found that they weren't alone. A team composed of two dark skinned genin, one female and the other male, the female having spiky red hair and the male having blond hair so pale it might as well be white. Roughly, Satsuki could guess that they were the same age as her, perhaps slightly older, but that could be their obvious musculature adding on to their size.

Both were gagged, unlike her, but then again Satsuki hardly had any comment to make and they probably hadn't deemed it necessary to gag either her or Sakura.

They were obviously from Kumo, given the headbands.

A little wiggling let Satsuki move enough that she could see yet another female, being slightly taller and slimmer than the other two from Kumo. She was also quite clearly more developed than any of the other four kunoichi in the room. She had no gag on, unlike her teammates, though her short blond hair showed signs of having come close to a blade recently.

All three of them looked positively murderous. Then again, if Satsuki could see herself in a mirror she'd be able to tell she was just as angry herself. This sort of shit wasn't in her plans and she didn't particularly like the lecherous looks that the men who surrounded the table gave them.

"D'aww, look, the genin think they be intimidatin'." A rather large and brawny man spoke, as he fumbled with the belt that held his pants up. Horrified, Satsuki realized that all of them were working on removing the lower half of their clothing, the one that would impede the proceedings. She was just waiting, at this point, for one of them to try and shove their dicks in her mouth.

She'd chomp it right off.

It'd probably get her killed, but she'd rather die with her dreams unfulfilled rather than let this filth have their way with her. That, and it'd probably give the other genin a distraction so they could try to come up with a way to escape, but she was feeling mostly enraged that they'd even dare pull their pants off. "You better kill me… because if I get free, and I will, I will hunt every last one of you down, and I will subject you to pain the likes of which has never been seen."

She saw most of them shiver and back away. She saw their movements clearly and perfectly, she saw the fear that crossed their faces before they remembered she was bound and helpless. She felt her eyes burn and her chakra sluggishly responding to her body's demands. "Shaddup, ya bitch!" a man whose only hair was his beard and the bushy forest of his pubes spoke. "Y'all ninja whores think yer almighty, we'll be seein' how tuff y'are when ya've got me dick'n yer ass." The drawl was nearly unintelligible, and Satsuki would've preferred not to understand his words.

"Yeah, all that exercise these bitches do must've made them nice and tight. Too bad they probably don't have anything to tear down there, eh? All that stretching they oughta do breaks the stuff without sex, I hear." A man who had already freed something that looked way too huge, fitting his huge frame, spoke.

"Now ya mooks, the cap'n wants these little shits properly broken so we can sell them like slaves. Y'all know the drill, we can have all the fun we want but no disfiguration and nothing that leaves a permanent mark!"

The men all convened around the table, and Satsuki felt her wrath and anger reach a boiling point when a scream of terror and panic ripped its way out of Sakura's throat, so powerful in volume and pitch that it left the Uchiha's ears ringing and a headache began to form.

The men went to clutch at their ears and cursed Sakura, calling her a variety of names and curses, following with threats of what they were about to do to her, which had her even further terrified and had even caused panic to throw a bucket of ice cold water on Satsuki's anger. This was it. The worst possible fate a person could meet. Raped to the breaking point and sold into slavery.

Was this how her life ended? Her goals… her ambition… her pain and suffering… all for naught because she'd been captured by an asshole of a pirate who just so happened to be a former shinobi!? Was that her lot in life? To suffer for the amusement of some unseen entity that would only delight in her pain?

Objectively, she knew she shared her fate with four other innocents, but she couldn't care less.

She'd had eight years of life before HE had snapped, gone crazy and ruined everything. And then, she'd dedicated his life to the pursuit of his demise, tried her hardest to grow as strong as she could. Someone grabbed onto her legs to still her, and only then did she realize she was struggling, as hard as she could, against her bonds.

She felt the cold sting of a knife almost cutting into her when her white shorts were destroyed by it. Her underwear came next, ripped by a rough, calloused hand off her, causing her noticeable pain. Belatedly, she realized that the others were in similar situations, though she, unlike the others, hadn't been flipped to lie on her stomach. She tried to cross her legs, growled and continued to struggle, but it was in vain.

All too soon, however, she felt exhaustion creep onto her, brought on from her chakra suddenly vanishing entirely, and she was out like a light. The last thing she had felt was that something warm and sticky covered most of her body.

* * *

The Last Uchiha's eyes opened suddenly and she felt panic grip her heart. She felt the cold bite of the terror that overtook her body suddenly disappear, and only warmth and an incredible feeling of simple safety washed over her. She shivered, unwillingly letting her body show her discomfort, yet she felt herself relaxing under the effects of the warmth that covered her.

She blinked a few times and her sight came into focus, the blurry images that had been truly unrecognizable suddenly taking the shape of Sakura's face, tears spilling from the jade eyes that Satsuki had never been more glad to see.

"W-What happened?" Satsuki asked, looking around.

"I… I don't know… I saw… I saw them rip off your panties but then I… I blacked out and…" Sakura sobbed. "It… it was so horrifying… We… The lessons… the academy never prepared us for something… something so vile and disgusting-"

"Sakura… are you… did they…"

"No." Sakura spoke, suddenly yet focused. "They… they couldn't… before I blacked out." She took a deep breath, trying to calm herself so her voice wouldn't keep cracking whenever she tried to speak.

Satsuki herself was living up to her ice princess moniker, remaining cool and calm outwardly despite any terror she might feel within. Sakura admired her for it, admired that composure that hadn't broken even when they'd been put through the ultimate test of their resolves this day. Sakura had cracked under the pressure and felt more panic and terror than she'd ever felt before, her fear affecting her even now, even though she was safe.

She could still feel their filthy, grimy and rough hands, gripping her body and keeping her still, spreading her legs and roaming all over her body and she felt like returning her breakfast to the outside… which she'd already done before, if the fact that there was a bucket filled with vomit not too far away was any indication.

"Something saved us." Satsuki concluded. Then she shivered, realizing there was nothing covering her lower body but a blanket thrown on top of her. She desperately wanted to take a bath, to scrub herself raw to remove the filthy taint of the insignificant maggots that had dared touch her body. She recalled their faces, their lecherous expressions and their man parts, and she shivered once again. "I will find them and kill them all."

"It's a little too late for that." A sudden interruption cut off her musings as the blonde from Kumo entered the room, distracting Satsuki from her anger and rage. Satsuki narrowed her eyes and glared at the kunoichi that came in, but the girl merely raised her hands in the universal symbol for a cease fire. "None of us was raped. An attempt was certainly made, but our teacher and your third teammate rescued us in the nick of time and killed all the pirates off."

While it was an admittedly reassuring thought, Satsuki immediately seized on the fact that she had just recalled this was a planned pirate attack that could not have possibly been so successful that they would have finished in such a short amount of time. Satsuki had to guess that most of the staff had been replaced with infiltrators, which left the question… "The attack. Is it over!?" she nearly snarled, hoping she'd have a chance to seek some payback.

"Yes." The blonde said. "As a whole, the ninja aboard the ship were able to repel the attack, though one genin from Iwa was raped and murdered. We were not the only ones intended to be sold as slaves after our captures. Every one of the pirates was found and either killed in battle or tortured to death by the jounin, while most genin suffered minor to major injuries. Most of the jounin suffered minor injuries, although our teacher, and yours, remain unharmed. Your third teammate, though…"

"N-Naruto!" Sakura squeaked. "She saved us, didn't she!? How is she!? Please, tell me!" Sakura nearly yelled.

Satsuki growled at how the blond ninja seemed to suddenly clamp down. The most developed kunoichi in the room took a deep breath. "She's… cool." She said, closing her eyes. "She's with your teacher right now…"

There was a note of… awe? Fear? Definitely something along these lines, in her voice. It caused Satsuki to blink. "What…"

"You… better take a bath and change your clothes." The blond kunoichi said, looking a little green. She was probably quite under the weather herself, though Satsuki had to admit she fit the 'Ice Princess' moniker even better than herself, given how well she'd kept her cool.

"I… see… thank you for your help, uh…"

"Samui." The girl provided. "While we might not be allies, we have shared a horrible experience. I was hoping we could be… friends." She said, sounding a little doubtful about her words, hesitant and shy, most likely.

Sakura tried to smile, but it came out weak and she faltered. She couldn't say no, even if she wanted to, because she dearly wanted to remind herself that she had avoided a horrible fate, and Samui reminded her of both the horrible event and their amazing fortune in being rescued in the nick of time.

The blonde left soon after, confirming to them that she would go check on her teammates, who were similarly distraught, and invited them over to drink some hot chocolate in their room with their sensei, stressing the safety that his presence would bring. At this point, Kakashi felt too unreliable, and meeting the man who'd been one of their rescuers was an enticing idea for both of the Konoha kunoichi.

It took a very, very long time for Sakura to let go of Satsuki. Even then, she was still incredibly clingy as she helped the last Uchiha off the bed she'd been placed in and, minding the Uchiha's wobbly legs product of the bruises lining them, helped her walk as they moved to the suite's built in bathroom.

Satsuki mused that, with all the commotion, she hadn't even thought that the room she was in was surprisingly fancy, something that her cheapskate of a sensei would never have sprung for unless something had forced him to. Both she and Sakura, however, agreed that the price was far too high for them and totally not worth it, even as they peeled off their clothes and walked into the showers together. Neither wanted to be alone right now.

It was funny how much both of them found themselves missing Naruto right now. She'd make a stupid joke that would be so unfunny it'd be funny, which would make them laugh and momentarily forget about the ordeal they'd just been through. She'd just smile and tell them everything would be okay and somehow they'd be able to believe her no matter what.

She'd be able to take the feeling of dirtiness clinging to them away, without having to scrub their skin a raw pink to do so. Lacking Naruto, however, both kunoichi had to content themselves with the act of rubbing a soapy washing cloth over their bodies with enough strength to peel off layers of their skin, taking away with it whatever remained of the monsters' bodily fluids.

Because that's what they had been. Remorseless, monstrous entities who would perform horrible acts and enjoy them.

Satsuki growled at herself. The dirty feeling covered her just didn't go away! She couldn't wash their filthy touch away! She scrubbed and scrubbed and scrubbed, ignoring the ever increasing pain in her legs in favor of the ever increasing panic…

… until a soft, soapy hand stopped her. Satsuki felt incredibly weak, her chakra was not up to the task of boosting her strength to make up for her deficiency yet. She didn't even realize, nor notice with the spray of the showerhead, that tears were running down her face. She felt a soft hand cup her chin and tilt it up, meeting those jade eyes that told her she was looking Sakura in the eye. "Satsuki-san…" Sakura mumbled.

"Why..?" Asked the Uchiha. "Why am I so weak?" She clarified, uncaring of Sakura's reaction. "I try and try, I train hard, I put my everything into every mission, every exercise and every book and scroll I can get my hands on!" A sob wracked her body. "Why am I so weak?! Why can't I get any stronger!? Everything I do always turns out to be in vain and somebody has to save me because I'm just a weak and foolish little girl who can't do anything right! I'm just a useless stain on the history of the Uchiha clan! I wasn't even a distant second best to Itachi, I didn't even register in his radar!"

"T-That's not true! You're not useless or weak at all!" Sakura spoke, her tone at first doubtful, yet filling with conviction as she continued. "You're Satsuki, the Rookie of the Year who got top marks in nearly everything in the academy!"

"And what good is that!? I'm a pathetic embarrassment to the Uchiha Clan's Legacy! My father was right, I'm not even a worthy fucking spare for Itachi! I can't do anything right! I couldn't learn that fucking fireball, I don't even have my stupid Sharingan!" Ranted the Uchiha, her fist moving with speed and strength she didn't know she possessed as she struck the tiles that lined the shower walls. "I couldn't do anything and the goddamn dead last had to come and save me! I should just give up trying to be a ninja! What point is there in even trying!? I should just worry about becoming a mother so that I can atleast fulfill one of my goals in life, rearing children is probably all I'm good for, if even that!"

The resounding crack of a slap cut through the sound of water hitting the floor and the sting cut through the grief and sorrow that had taken possession of the young Uchiha. Her pink haired teammate scowled at her, and Satsuki realized she'd fallen on her butt and was now cradling her stinging cheek. "You're wrong." Sakura informed her, her tone clipped and unnervingly calm. "Satsuki, you were incredibly brave! If you don't believe me, I'm sure Kakashi-sensei would back me up on this! I… I was so terrified I couldn't even think when that man tied us up, but you were the one who tried to chew through our ropes and didn't give up even after things looked grim! Don't sell yourself short!"

Satsuki felt another sob wrack her body. "What good is all that courage if I don't have the skill or ability to back it up!?"

The pinkette kneeled so she was face to face with the Uchiha, locking jade green with onyx black. "Satsuki… The man who restrained us was a jounin. And a very good one if his proficiency with the sealing arts is anything to go by. He drew seals on us using only our chakra, that takes a lot of skill, according to the books I read on it. Plus, he was clearly able to plan a very elaborate attack that only failed because he underestimated the quality of some of the genin and jounin on board." Sakura explained, placing her arms on Satsuki's shoulders and ignoring the unpleasantly hot water that hit her back. "We couldn't honestly be expected to win that fight. Even… even Kakashi sensei would have had trouble with him, at our age, and he was already a jounin by then."

Satsuki had a grim expression on her face. She was just reminded that she didn't meet Kakashi's standards for training. Yet another prodigious genius had deigned her unworthy… "I'm supposed to be a prodigy…" She mumbled.

Sakura didn't speak. She just pulled Satsuki close to her and held her, letting the Uchiha work out her frustration and rage at herself through her tears. Sakura felt much like crying herself, but just as Satsuki had been a pillar of strength all throughout the academy, representing what Sakura wanted to be seen as, a strong, competent and driven kunoichi, during their academy days, Sakura would now be a pillar of strength that would try to glue the pieces of the Uchiha back together.

It was only fair, after all, to repay her for the inspiration.

Strangely, Sakura thought that the fact that Satsuki was a human being who fell prey to the same sorrows and weaknesses that other humans fell to, only further enhanced her strength. And it would show, because Sakura fervently believed that the Uchiha would not be kept down by something like this. She had suffered horribly before and gotten back up. The strength necessary to do that was what Sakura had admired so much from the Uchiha, and she knew that it was still there.

Everyone needs somebody they can rely on, every once in a while.

Neither truly wished to move much after their bath as they climbed into bed together, holding onto each other for comfort and warmth beneath the blankets, dressed in the night clothing offered to them by a few concerned and thankful nobles (finer silks than anything they'd ever worn before).

* * *

Samui paused, looking around and seeing nothing out of the ordinary in either the wooden floors or the immaculate white walls. Of course, when she turned around, she saw nothing behind herself. Very nervous and slightly afraid, she turned back to the direction she'd been going at in the first place and yelped, taking a step back. "Oh, it's you." She said, calming down noticeably.

"Are you alright?" The other figure asked, tilting her head and causing a cascade of golden spikes to spill over her shoulder. Samui shrugged, indicating that she was not gonna answer that question truthfully, which was fair enough given that such information was probably not commonly given. "How are they?"

"I think both are hiding a lot of their fear and pain… I do not think your academy prepared them very well." Samui explained, sighing. "While a real situation is far more shocking and unnerving than a simulation, I admit that our training in such situations has made this much more bearable."

"I see…" Naruto said, frowning slightly.

Samui sighed, calming her nerves somewhat as she did so, however she didn't fully relax. The sun was starting to set and the unlit areas would soon get pretty dark. She'd hoped that her new friends would join her and her team in a bonding activity, but given the lack of light, she found it unlikely. Regardless, the cruise had several days left until they got to the closest port to sort out the massive complications they'd come across. "You should probably change your clothes…"

"I have nothing else. I… kinda forgot to bring extra changes with me and the outfit they loaned me was ruined in the fight."

Samui pursed her lips. "Still…"

Naruto shrugged. "They're clean and comfortable and, for the moment, it's enough for me." She spoke, looking down at the long red coat trimmed in gold she wore, which had sleeves that were a fair bit longer than her arms and which almost touched the ground.

"Still… you took his sword, too."

"It was mine to begin with. Apparently, I have a clan, and this thing…" She lifted a pure white sheath, decorated with an elaborate golden design near the blade's small cross guard and tipped with gold on the tip, along with the blade in it, which was a simple weapon that wasn't outwardly unique. Surprisingly, it happened to be the perfect size for Naruto to use as a katana. "… belonged to them. I also took his hat. I liked it."

Samui frowned. She was far too casual about the fact she'd fought a jounin, admittedly with backup provided by two rather powerful jounin, and come out on top, not to mention the things that Samui had seen but nobody else in those kitchens had. She'd been the only one to remain awake. Ultimately, Samui said nothing about the other blonde's choice of action or words.

"Oh, well. I'll see you tomorrow, Samui-chan! B-nii told me he'd show me some of his raps tomorrow! I can't wait!" Naruto said, grinning and running past Samui to the room she and her teammates had been moved to after the pirate attack.

Once she was gone, Samui permitted herself a full body shiver and she rubbed at her upper arms, before walking off at a brisk pace.

* * *

OMAKE: When Canon Attacks

"This is, very clearly, a joke." Sasuke stated.

"It can't be anything else." Satsuki replied, glaring at her male counterpart. "This is so non canon it hurts."

Both of them crossed their arms and huffed, angry at each other. They then turned away, closed their eyes and grunted. "You're trying way too hard to be cool." They said in a chorus so perfect that neither noticed. They turned back to glare at each other.

"Oi, get a room, you two!" Naruto spoke, raising a blond eyebrow and leaning back in the lawn chair that one of his clones had transformed into. He made the handseal to bring another clone into existence. "Yo, Naru-chan, want more lemonade?"

"I'm so jealous of that jutsu!" Naruto cried indignantly. "Author-sama, why can't I have cool things like that?" She asked, looking at the fourth wall with tear filled eyes.

"Because the author is sick and tired of seeing Kage Bunshin used as a crutch, plus the whole thing with us training to be super strong in no time at all using the clones would really throw the story's flow out of whack. Meh, you're cool the way you are, Naru-chan!" The blond spoke, reaching over and ruffling the girl's hair.

"You're pretty cool yourself!" the blonde replied.

Sakura sighed. "I'm surrounded by idiots." She spoke, rubbing the bridge of her nose.

The other Sakura looked at her. "Wait, if the Sasuke in your world is female… does that mean you're a lesbian?" She asked, blinking in confusion.

"No! I'm not a goddamn lesbian!" Sakura cried out in indignation.

"Bullshit you aren't!" Naruto replied.

"I can't even begin to describe how cool your universe is, Naru-chan." Naruto replied. "Wait, how old are we in this omake?" he asked.

"That depends." Naruto replied. "On whether or not those two over there…" She began, pointing at where Sasuke and Satsuki had engaged in good old fisticuffs. "… are gonna have sex after beating each other up."

"So… legal, then?" Naruto asked.

"What describes 'legal', anyway?" Sakura asked. "I mean, pretty much every country and culture has a different age at which they'd consider something proper. So what could be potentially seen as okay in one culture would be terribly offensive in another."

The other Sakura hummed. "Like your obvious lesbian crush on Satsuki." She mused. "In some countries, it's seen as an immature phase that you have to grow out of…" She absent mindedly coughed something that sounded a bit like a certain country in Asia's name. "… while in others, it's seen as immoral since you're still underage, but would be perfectly accepted if you were, say, three years older."

Naruto had procured popcorn out of nowhere. Both of them. They were munching on it while they watched the fireworks that ensued from the two Uchiha fighting. "Wow. I didn't know Satchan could bend that way!"

"I didn't know that Sasuke was that flexible either! You know, your Sasuke is kinda cute…"

"Oh, hell naw!" The two Sakura spoke in unison, getting on either side of Naruto and punching him upside the head.

"Hm… Well, if he scowled less and smiled a little more, I'm sure your Sasuke would be plenty attractive too…" the female Naruto mused. Then she grinned.

The two Uchiha immediately stopped fighting as they felt a chill running down their spines. "For some reason, every single one of my instincts is telling me to run, run and never look back." Sasuke informed.

Satsuki nodded and helped him to his feet. Both were running for the hills in a second flat.

"Aw, Satchan! Sasuke-kun! Come back!" Naruto yelled, standing up and running after them with a grin.

One Sakura blushed from anger, the other from shame. "Is she always like this?" The canon flavor Sakura asked.

"You have no idea…" Yuri Flavor Sakura replied.

Naruto raised his head and grinned at them. "I think I'm in love!" He said, as he saw both of the 'Last Loyal Uchiha' running away from his female counterpart. Then he was off like a shot after them.

Sakura sighed. "You're used to minimizing the damage Naruto causes, right?"

"Well, yes. I'm willing to bet that mine is more disruptive to missions, though."

"Really? How so?"

"You'll see… I just hope she doesn't get the bright idea to henge into the nine tailed fox or something equally stupid…"

* * *

Hope the Omake is satisfying enough, Oblitus-Umbrae. I enjoy the tonal whiplash it has with the rest of the chapter, though if you had something more serious in mind, lemme know and I'll write another omake next chapter that's serious in tone.

And yes, Oblitus-Umbrae was the first to guess that the Daimyo of Wind Country is Ashikaga Choushin, even if the name wasn't given accurately (I still count a partial match).

Now, now, now… let's go for something a bit more difficult.

You'll have to guess what the name of the Daimyo of the Land of Whirlpools is! While the ninja village that housed the Uzumaki clan is no more, the Whirlpool Country and its royal family still exists!

The hint for this one is simple: Their art and the Naruto world's art of sealing are very similar!


End file.
